LOS ANGELES — Bama247 was able to catch up with Alabama offensive line coach Chris Kapilovic on Tuesday.
As the Crimson Tide prepare to play No. 1 Indiana in the quarterfinals of the College Football Playoff at the Rose Bowl, Kapilovic shared his thoughts on the development of Michael Carroll, William Sanders and Jackson Lloyd.
He also spoke about the line’s recent improvement in run blocking, the scaling back of the rotation up front, and, given that it’s that time of year, what his future holds.
On Michael Caroll being able to come in and contribute as a freshman
“Yeah, it says a lot about him to be able to play the true freshman at this level of football, right? And the thing about him that’s impressive is no matter how big the moment is, it doesn’t overwhelm him. You know, he’s almost got that confidence in himself that’s so high that it’s a good thing. You know what I mean? And what we’ve seen from him, you saw flashes, you know, in spring and fall camp. And then every time we gave him reps in the game early on, he played at a high level and you saw his ability, and he just earned the trust of us as a staff to get him out there and believe he was one of our best guys. And, you know, each week is it’s own challenge, and he’s had some really good moments and he’s had some fresh in the moments, but overall, you watch him as a true freshman, I feel like he’s done a heck of a job.
On William Sanders’ emergence
“Will Sanders has just continued to grow and improve mentally and physically since I arrived here. And what he did is he showed some flashes against our defense in training camp that were like, ‘Wow.’ He was doing some things that nobody else was doing. He’s got a twitchiness to him and an explosiveness of power that some guys just don’t have. He’s not the biggest guy, but there he is a powerful. There’s just some guys that have a core strength. You look at Parker Brailsford, that guy is really strong and explosive. And Will is a very stout guy that has that twitchiness and that snap that not all big guys have. So as we gave him reps early in the year, you know, he did a good job. He’ just continued to earn our trust. I think there’s a big future for him in our program.”
On Jackson Lloyd’s development
“Jackson, you know, love Jackson. He’s like the quintessential tackle, right? Athletic, long. You know, it’s a huge jump for playing high school football in Carmel, California and playing at Alabama, and he’s handled that well. And we’ve seen his improvement throughout the season, right? There’s things we got to get better at, but he’s been able to get in the game here and there in some critical situations, handled it well. So we really feel good about his future with us as well.”
Speaking of future, with Nick Sheridan heading to Michigan State, what does your future hold?
“You know, I’m here today, and all I’m focused on is getting these guys ready to beat Indiana. You know, obviously, I love being at Alabama. You know, obviously we’ve had some ups and downs this year on the offense, but I do feel like our best days are ahead of us. And my whole thought process right now is, let’s beat Indiana.”
On what’s improved with the running game, whether that’s the line or the backs or both
“We could talk a long time about it, and if people really just delved into the film and watched it, the run game, there’s so much to it. The o-line, it starts with them. But then there’s a lot of pieces that come with it. And there’s just been times this year, for whatever reason, that it may be the situation of the game or it may be just one person or one player just didn’t do their job, and it wasn’t successful. You know, I thought the Auburn game was a good. You know, we really emphasized the run, and the guys did some really good things there. I think the thing that’s lost sometimes is when we’ve had to run the ball at times, like even down by the goal line, you look what we did against Oklahoma in both those games where they hadn’t given up I don’t know how many touchdowns, 15 or something, our guys were able to run it in. We’ve closed out some games in four-minute situations. We’ve been pretty good on third-and-short. So there’s a lot that goes to it. And I just think we’ve had some continuity in the O line the last half of the season, outside of injuries, you know? And I think all that ties together.”
On whether it was a conscious decision to scale back to rotation on the line and what went into that
“Well, I think the biggest thing was some of the rotation was because of health, and some of it was just finding, like, what combination is going to be the best combination for us. And I think that as the year went on and we we started putting Wilkin Formby in at guard and Michael next to him, we felt like there were some really good things there, and being able to play Geno [VanDeMark] and Kam [Dewberry] together, and, you know, just there was a little more continuity there. We felt like they were doing some good things. And that’s why we’ve kind of stayed with that rotation.”
