Preparing your team for the National Championship is no easy task, as you can imagine. One thing that both Alabama head coach Nick Saban and Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney used during the week of preparation: former players in practice, to simulate opposing players.
Bama and Clemson used former players in practice to prepare for each other
This is completely allowed under NCAA rules.
Clemson used former Tiger and NFL quarterback Tajh Boyd to simulate dual threat Tide quarterback Jalen Hurts. That makes sense, though Boyd did pay a price.
Boyd was used last week, as well, to simulate Ohio State quarterback J.T. Barrett in the week leading up to Clemson’s Fiesta Bowl semifinal game. Clemson’s defense held Barrett to just 127 yards passing and two interceptions in the 31-0 Tigers victory.
Saban also said that he was going to use former players to simulate Tigers quarterback Deshaun Watson. What we don’t know is who he used, but he does have someone already on his team who’s simmed Watson before: Hurts. Last year, Hurts was used on the scout team to prepare the defense for Watson, just days after stepping foot on campus. The Tide beat Clemson 45-40 in last year’s National Championship.
Alabama has taken advantage of this rule several times before during the season. Former Crimson Tide quarterback Blake Sims was used to simulate Aggies quarterback Trevor Knight. For Alabama’s game against LSU in November, former NFL running back Trent Richardson and NFL quarterback John Parker Wilson were brought in to simulate LSU’s Leonard Fournette and Danny Etling.
You’re probably wondering how Alabama and Clemson are allowed to do this. As it turns out, all schools can legally have non-students participate in practice, thanks to an exception to the practice rules that the NCAA adopted in 2011. NCAA bylaw 14.2.1.6 reads:
A former student at the certifying institution (e.g., former student-athlete) may participate in an organized practice session on an occasional basis, provided the institution does not publicize the participation of the former student at any time before the practice session.
As long as a player’s participation is “occasional” and the schools don’t inform the public beforehand about alumni at practice, everything’s OK with the NCAA.
Bama won all three of those games, so it’s worked well for the Tide in the past. Other teams might try this out, too — just look at Urban Meyer’s face when he found out about the rule at a presser.
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