Watch Nick Saban’s Press Conference to Start Fresno State Game Week

With Florida State in the rear-view, the Alabama football team now turns its attention to a meeting with Fresno State on Saturday.

The Crimson Tide is a 44-point favorite in its home opener, but Nick Saban and his staff will have to make preparations for this game without two of its top defenders.

"With injury updates, Christian Miller and Terrell Lewis will be out for the year," Saban said. "Both of them have season-ending surgeries coming up. Rashaan Evans and Anfernee Jennings both have significant injuries that won’t be long-term. We’ll list them as questionable, so they’ll be day-to-day, but it’s uncertain as to when they’ll be able to come back and play. We’re hopeful that it will be sooner than later."

Alabama should have an opportunity to play some young players and gain some experience against a team that went 1-11 last year. The Bulldogs, however, opened the season with a 66-0 win over Incarnate Word last weekend.

“With Fresno State, Jeff Tedford is one of the best coaches offensively in the country. He was the head coach at Cal for many years, won lots of games and went to lots of bowl games. Fresno State returns lots of starters – nine on offense, six on defense and a couple specialists. This is a much-improved team; they played really well and looked really good in their opening game, where they scored 66 points and shut the other team out. They’ve got a good quarterback, they’ve got a couple good receivers and they’ve got some good players on defense. This is going to be a different kind of challenge for us and something our players will have to respond to because this a much-improved team.”

Listen to everything Saban had to say during his Monday press conference in the video above.