Tide find confidence with Arkansas victory

TUSCALOOSA - To reclaim confidence, relevance and championships, this is why Alabama hired Nick Saban.

Saban, the fourth coach in Alabama history to win his first three games has seemingly achieved two of those goals with the Crimson Tide's 41-38 win Saturday against Arkansas.

Even before the final whistle, the Tide played with renewed confidence.

Before electing to kick a 42-yard field goal to cut Arkansas' lead to 4 with 4:20 to play, Saban asked his defense if it could get the ball back. The answer was a resounding "yes," and the defensive players came through. They had no choice.

"Stuff like that just shows how confident they are," senior receiver D.J. Hall said. "When you have a coach like that, you have no choice. He has all this confidence in us. We're not going to let him down."

The offense followed with a 73-yard game-winning drive.

It marked the first time since a 14-13 against Iowa State in the 2001 Independence Bowl that the Crimson Tide had overcome a fourth-quarter deficit to win, something unseen during Mike Shula's tenure.

"This football team is just different (than last year's)," Hall said. "You can just tell from the staff and the players."

Hall was a shining example of all that was right for the Tide in the first half. He needed 38 yards to become Alabama's all-time leading receiver. He got them and broke Ozzie Newsome's record with a 43-yard reception.

Despite missing most of the second half with sore left quadriceps, Hall led all receivers with 172 yards and two touchdowns on six catches and now has 2,208 career receiving yards.

A rejuvenated John Parker Wilson played a significant role in Hall's success, completing 6-of-9 passes for 138 yards and two touchdowns in the first quarter.

Wilson made strides to improve upon his shaky previous passing performances, finishing with 24 completions on 45 attempts for 327 yards and four touchdowns - all career bests. He engineering Alabama's game-winning drive.

"If we can run and throw it all in the same game, we'll be getting where we want to go." Saban said.

Saban knows his team isn't there yet. The second half showed it. Wilson struggled late, fumbling a snap and throwing an interception to fuel a 28-point comeback.

"Hopefully we'll learn from those inconsistencies," Saban said.