BamaOnLine.com - Notebook: Square out for the season

September 14, 2009

Christopher Walsh
BamaOnLine.com Senior Writer

TUSCALOOSA | The University of Alabama football team will have a little less depth on the defensive line after a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) confirmed that redshirt freshman defensive end Damion Square sustained a torn anterior cruciate ligament during the fourth quarter of Saturday night's 40-14 victory against Florida International.

Square will have surgery Tuesday and is out for the season.

"That's a real big loss," senior nose guard Terrence Cody said. "We have only so many defensive linemen who are on scholarship, but we'll be able to get through it and work around it."

The news was better for sophomores Julio Jones and Roy Upchurch, who left the game in the first quarter.

Upchurch sustained a high left ankle sprain and is considered day-to-day, although Coach Nick Saban said it could be a "few days or a few weeks."

Tests confirmed that Jones had a bruised knee after taking a helmet hit. He had a slight limp Monday afternoon.

"He has no other significant damage, as soon as the trauma settles down he'll be ok," Saban said. "He's day-to-day as well and there's no way to determine how long this is going to take, but it shouldn't take more than a few days."

Jones and Upchurch were in black, signaling no contact, and riding stationary bikes during the observation period of Monday's practice inside the Hank Crisp Facility, along with freshman receiver Kenny Bell (shin splints).

Square, who redshirted last season, had worked his way into the defensive line rotation, and was also on the kick-return unit. He had one tackle, ? tackle for a loss, and a quarterback hurry.

"It's really too bad," Saban said. "Damion Square was a defensive end who we moved to Jack (linebacker) to give us a more bigger, physical guy, but really his role was to play defensive end in nickel and dime situations."

Junior Milton Talbert and true freshman Darrington Sentimore are among those who might get more playing time. The coaching staff would prefer not to move sophomore Marcell Dareus again after doing so two weeks ago, from being senior end Lorenzo Washington's backup to starting for senior end Brandon Deaderick after he was shot in a failed robbery.

Dodge out
North Texas coach Todd Dodge announced Monday morning that his son, starting quarterback Riley, will miss Saturday's game with a second-degree separated shoulder sustained during Saturday's 31-30 overtime loss to Ohio. He had completed 12 of 22 passes for 117 yards when the injury occurred to his non-throwing shoulder.

"Just got the MRI this morning, he will not play," Todd Dodge said during a conference call Monday. "Nathan Tune will be our starter."

Tune, a junior, completed 9 of 15 passes for 69 yards in relief. Last season he played in six games and completed 6 of 13 pass attempts for 55 yards.

"He's a very good athlete and really makes their offense go," Saban said about Riley Dodge.

Awards
Running back Trent Richardson, who saw his first significant action against FIU, was named the SEC freshman of the week.

After being pressed into service due to Upchurch's injury and Mark Ingram coming off the flu, Richardson had 118 rushing yards on 15 carries and two touchdowns, and also caught two passes for 23 yards.

Sophomore linebacker Dont'a Hightower was an honorable mention selection for defensive player of the week. He had six tackles, 2? for a loss, a sack and two quarterback hurries.

Both were also recognized by the coaching staff. Richardson shared the offensive player of the week honors along with senior receiver Mike McCoy and junior left tackle James Carpenter, while senior nose guard Terrence Cody was the co-defensive player of the week. Sharing the special teams awards were senior Javier Arenas and true freshman Dre Kirkpatrick.

Tide-bits
CBS has picked up next week's Arkansas at Alabama game, with kickoff scheduled for 2:30 p.m. at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Other SEC games to be televised Sept. 26 include LSU at Mississippi State (11:21 a.m., SEC Network), Florida at Kentucky (5 p.m., ESPN2), Arizona State at Georgia (6 p.m., ESPNU), Ball State at Auburn (6 p.m., Fox Sports Net), Vanderbilt at Rice (7 p.m., CSS), and Ohio at Tennessee (6 p.m. pay per view).

Saban on the evaluating the team after the FIU win: "I think the biggest thing was that we made some improvement from week one to week two, certainly there are some things we need to improve on but we made less mental errors in the game. I think we played faster, had really good balance on offense, passing efficiency was very good, certainly had more explosive plays, finished the game in the fourth quarter, played very well in the second half, didn't turn the ball over on offense. Defensively we stopped the run, improved our ability to affect the quarterback, our pass rush was better." As for concerns, he mentioned, "We're not as good on third down as we have (been) in the past."

Junior cornerback Kareem Jackson was happy that he's not on kickoff coverage anymore because, "They're going to get an earful today." Alabama went so far as to put better players on the scout team to test the coverage unit during last week's practices, but the Tide still gave up its second special-teams touchdown against FIU. "We're over-squeezing the field, not staying in our lanes. I don't think it's a personnel thing as much of a responsibility and discipline issue, of recognizing where everybody's supposed to be," Saban said. "We also have safeties on these plays, we may give up 40 or 50 yards, but not touchdowns."
For Cody, the good thing about having the flu already is that he probably won't get it again. "It was real bad," he said. "I couldn't do anything, I couldn't eat anything. All I was able to do was lay in the bed."

Terry Grant was back at running back after working with the wide receivers last week.

The university is still awaiting word from the NCAA regarding the status of backup linebacker Jerrell Harris. "We'll release it when we get a final answer on that," Saban said.

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