Alabama
Alabama Football 2024 Preview: What you need to know about the USF Bulls’ offense
![Alabama Football 2024 Preview: What you need to know about the USF Bulls’ offense Alabama Football 2024 Preview: What you need to know about the USF Bulls’ offense](https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/omzTw60OwxfMU18nyEW5aGPLiBQ=/0x0:5247x2747/fit-in/1200x630/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25602756/usa_today_22156510.jpg)
One year ago, the USF Bulls were coming off of a 3-year stretch of being one of the worst teams in all of college football (you can thank Dabo for sending them Jeff Scott) and they had just hired Alex Golesh, the offensive coordinator at Tennessee who had the Vols and Hendon Hooker being all the rage in college football.
We didn’t totally know what to expect, but the Bulls were expected to improve on offense, at least. A few games into the season, and they took on Alabama, giving the Tide one of the most frustrating games of Nick Saban’s career. Except, for some reason, it was because the Bulls kept Alabama’s offense in check, not because their offense ran wild.
Whatever the case, the game seemed to be both a springboard and a fluke for them, as their defense was generally bad in 2023, but they turned into one of the better offenses in the country and racked up 7 wins ( a big deal when you won less than two for three straight years).
in 2024, much of the same offense returns. This is what I wrote about their scheme last year, and much of it remains true:
As a Heupel disciple, the offensive scheme is one that Alabama fans are now familiar with: the wide receivers will be lined up WIDE, and the ball will often be snapped within 10 seconds of the previous play ending. It’s an offense predicated on very little mental work from the QB, but more of a stand-up-and-throw it kind of thing that relies on slants, screens, and the occasional go-ball for most of the passing game.
So far, though, it’s not been too effective through the air. First year starter QB Byrum Brown is sitting at 51.5% completion rate, a paltry 5.3 yards per attempt, and 2 interceptions to 4 TDs. Receiver Sean Atkins is the only returning pass catcher from last year’s team, and small slot guy is Brown’s favorite target. Khafre Brown (transfer from UNC) also caught an 80-yard go ball in the season opener, so he leads the team with 109 yards.
The rushing game, on the other hand, has been much more of the focus for Golesh. Transfer Nay’Quan Wright played on and off for the Florida Gators the last four years, and now takes over as the lead back, rushing 17 times for 111 yards against WKU in the opener.
Meanwhile, Michel Dukes was a transfer from Clemson a couple of years ago that got 62 touches for the Bulls last year and looks to be building on that role this year. He’s got 21 carries for 104 yards so far. Both backs are averaging over 5 yards per carry through two games. The USF offense is built to spread a defense out as wide as possible and have them open up running lanes between the tackle/guard or just off tackle with TE’s coming across the formation as a lead blocker.
And, of course, Byrum Brown is really the centerpiece of the rushing attack. There’s plenty of designed QB draws, and USF has 0 issues calling a speed option play on 3rd and long. Brown is lanky and quick. He’s not going to break many tackles, but he can gobble up open yards in a hurry. He leads the team with 183 rushing yards.
Byrum Brown really turned things on as the season progressed last year, completing 65% of his passes for 3300 yards and 26 TDs to only 11 picks, while also leading the team with 809 rushing yards and 11 more TDs on the ground. He’s as dynamic of a runner as you’ll find at QB in college football, and he’s steadily improving as a passer. Slot receiver Sean Atkins also returns as a his main target from a year ago, and the diminutive receiving threat is a Biletnikoff Watch list and First Team All-AAC preseason guy who looks poised to really build on his 1000 yards from last year.
Running back Nay’quan Wright (the guy who trucked Caleb Downs last year) returns as well as a former SEC running back that can really do some damage on the ground.
Overall, it’s a fast, dynamic offense that takes some parts of the Tennessee/Huepel offense – the wide splits and the ridiculously fast tempo – but incorporates more of a power running and QB option game out of those wide splits. Screens and deep shots make up the bulk of the passing game to stretch the defense as far from the middle as possible, then they’ll relentlessly run the ball at those vacated areas.
For Alabama’s new look “Swarm” defense, this will be something of a test to see how the new scheme fares against what is considered the up and coming current trend of college football offenses. Can the linebacker crew handle the QB run, or will they get caught vacating rush lanes? Can the new secondary effectively swarm to screen passes while still being wary of the vertical shots?
I think Alabama may do better against the QB scrambles than we’ve seen in years past, as the defensive coverage should be more focused on watching the QB than under Saban’s pattern-match coverages. But I do worry that the Bulls may be able to get some deep shots on them and score a few more points than we like.
I predict they will score 17 on the Alabama defense.
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Alabama
Looking ahead: How Alabama football commitments performed during high school action
![Looking ahead: How Alabama football commitments performed during high school action Looking ahead: How Alabama football commitments performed during high school action](https://www.gannett-cdn.com/authoring/authoring-images/2024/08/24/USAT/74937344007-74927638007-carver-00.jpg?auto=webp&crop=2199,1238,x0,y17&format=pjpg&width=1200)
The high school football season is well underway around the country, and it is time to start tracking how Alabama football commits fared over the last week of high school action.
Each week, The Tuscaloosa News will track how some of the top Alabama football commitments performed during high school games the week before. Here’s a roundup of how some of future Crimson Tide players performed during high school action from the week of Aug. 19.
Anthony Rogers
Carver-Montgomery (Montgomery, Alabama), running back
Performance: Rogers continued with his dominance this season, scoring a rushing touchdown in Carver’s 44-12 win over Percy Julian. Rogers touchdown came from more than 30 yards out with him breaking multiple tackles while getting to the end zone.
Lotzeir Brooks
Millville (Millville, New Jersey), wide receiver
Performance: Brooks set a New Jersey high school football state record, reaching 54 career touchdown receptions in his team’s 35-0 win over Holy Spirit last week. In the win, Brooks had five catches for 200 yards and three touchdowns.
London Simmons
Hartfield Academy (Flowood, Mississippi), defensive lineman
Performance: In Flowood’s 40-0 win over Simpson Academy last week, Simmons accounted for five total tackles —three assisted, two solo — along with three tackles for loss. Simmons currently sits at 11 total tackles and four tackles for loss three games into the season.
Luke Metz
Mill Creek (Hoschton, Georgia), linebacker
Performance: In Mill Creek’s 48-14 win over Archer, Metz accounted for four tackles, one of those being for loss, along with one sack. He now sits as 28 total tackles on the season, four for loss and three sacks.
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Kaleb Edwards
Oak Ridge (El Dorado Hills, California), tight end
Performance: Edwards had six receptions for 84 yards, a long of 25-yards, and one touchdown. It marks the four-star tight ends first touchdown of the 2024 season.
Alabama
Alabama sets execution date for convicted ax murderer Derrick Dearman, who killed 5 people
![Alabama sets execution date for convicted ax murderer Derrick Dearman, who killed 5 people Alabama sets execution date for convicted ax murderer Derrick Dearman, who killed 5 people](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/09/88878645.jpg?quality=75&strip=all&w=1024)
A convicted ax murderer who killed five people will be executed by lethal injection in Alabama — the fifth prisoner to be put to death in the state this year, the governor announced on Tuesday.
Derrick Dearman, 35, was convicted in the savage slaying of five friends and family members of his then-girlfriend — including a pregnant woman and her unborn child — in a meth-fueled massacre in Citronelle, Alabama in 2016.
Dearman fired his attorneys earlier this year and ended all appeals of his conviction and death sentence.
“I’ve decided to drop my appeals and have my sentence carried out… I was fairly tried and convicted. I agreed with the court’s decision,” he told AL.com in a phone interview from death row this spring.
“Whether I was in my right mind or not, innocent lives were lost and the crime was committed,” he said.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey announced Dearman will be executed between 12 a.m. October 17 and 6 a.m. October 18.
He chose to die by lethal injection rather than nitrogen hypoxia — a controversial execution method that was introduced to Alabama just this year.
While Dearman had said earlier this year he wasn’t prepared to die any time soon, he penned a letter to the Alabama Attorney General’s Office last month, outraged that other death row inmates were jumping line ahead of him, according to AL.com.
“I have done everything that is required to drop my appeals and have my sentence carried out and I am compotent [sic] and of a sound mind…can you please respond to this letter to let me know what the hold up is??????” the convict wrote.
“All this is hard on not only me but my family and the longer it takes the more me and my family have to go through,” Dearman added.
Dearman was abusive towards his girlfriend at the time, Laneta Lester, and the day before the killings, Lester’s brother picked her up and took her to safety at his home in a remote area of Mobile County near Citronelle, according to court documents.
Dearman showed up at the home multiple times that night, but no one there would allow him inside.
In the early morning hours of Aug. 20, 2016, Dearman picked up an ax from the yard, broke into the home and started hacking at the victims while they slept.
After attacking five victims with an ax and fatally shooting them, Dearman forced Lester, who was unharmed, and a 3-month-old child into a car and drove them to his father’s house in Mississippi.
The victims were Lester’s brother Joseph Adam Turner, 26; Robert Lee Brown, 26; Chelsea Marie Reed, 22; Justin Kaleb Reed, 23; and Shannon Melissa Randall, 35.
Chelsea Reed was pregnant with her and Justin Reed’s first child.
The 3-month-old boy, who was in bed with them at the time, was the first son of Turner and Randall.
He turned himself in the next day and admitted to authorities that he was “strung out” on drugs during the killings.
“If I was sober, that would have never happened,” he told AL.com.
Dearman was put on death row in 2018. He is scheduled to be the fifth person put to death in Alabama this year.
Alabama
Alabama sets sixth execution for 2024 • Alabama Reflector
![Alabama sets sixth execution for 2024 • Alabama Reflector Alabama sets sixth execution for 2024 • Alabama Reflector](https://alabamareflector.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Derrick-Dearman-horizontal.jpg)
Alabama will attempt to conduct a sixth execution this year, which would tie the state for the most in the past 50 years.
Gov. Kay Ivey Tuesday set an Oct. 17 execution date for Derrick Dearman, 36, who confessed to killing Robert Lee Brown, 26; Chelsea Marie Reed, 22; Justin Kaleb Reed, 23; Joseph Adam Turner, 26 and Shannon Melissa Randall, 35, on August 20, 2016. Chelsea Reed was five months pregnant.
The day of the murders, Dearman drove to a house west of Citronelle in Mobile County where his girlfriend had gone to escape him and end their relationship. Dearman killed the five people in the house, then drove his estranged girlfriend and the infant of one of the victims to his father’s house in Mississippi, where he let them go. Dearman later turned himself into the police in Greene County, Mississippi.
Dearman pleaded guilty to the murders in 2018, but a trial took place as required by state law in capital cases. A jury sentenced Dearman to death. The state plans to execute Dearman by lethal injection.
Dearman earlier this year fired his attorneys and wrote to Ivey and Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, asking them to set his execution date. He told CNN in April that it was “the only option that would help the victims’ families get the closure they need to move forward.”
“From my point of view, there’s nothing I could ever say or do to make this right,” Dearman said. “I feel like I personally have a debt for the crimes that I committed. That’s the only way that I could ever show that I’m truly remorseful, that I truly do have a conscience.”
Dearman’s execution would be the fifth conducted in 2024 and the sixth to be scheduled. The state executed Kenneth Eugene Smith by nitrogen gas in January. Jamie Ray Mills, executed in May, and Keith Edmund Gavin, executed in July, were both put to death by lethal injection. Alan Eugene Miller is scheduled to be executed by nitrogen gas this month, and Carey Grayson by nitrogen gas in November.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Alabama last executed six people in 2011. It also executed six people in 2009. Both were the most for the state since executions resumed in 1983.
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