Jalen Milroe had an excellent night of passing for Alabama football Saturday. The quarterback threw for three touchdowns and 194 yards against Middle Tennessee State in the Crimson Tide’s season-opener.

After the game, Nick Saban acknowledged the performance, but noted that it will be more difficult in the coming matchup with Texas, especially for Alabama’s wide receivers.

“We’re going to have to separate against a little different caliber guy in the future,” Saban said. “So it’s gonna be important we working on that and understand that and it will be fine.”

Texas blew out Rice in its opening game, winning 37-10. The Longhorns grabbed two interceptions against Owls quarterback JT Daniels.

The Longhorn secondary is experienced, featuring cornerbacks Terrance Bush and Ryant Watts, along with safeties Jalen Catalan and Jerrin Thompson. On Wednesday, Saban said he was impressed by the group.

“They’ve got some really good players,” Saban said. “They’ve got an outstanding corner. They got a couple really good safeties. They’ve got experience. These guys, fast reactors. They play man-to-man, they can cover you. They tackle well. They can play the ball. They’re good man-to-man players, so those three factors in the secondary are always thing you look for to really have a successful unit and it’s gonna be a challenge for us to be able to beat man-to-man and to be able to take advantage of things in the passing game.”

Milroe also showed off his ability to move, rushing for two touchdowns and leading the Crimson Tide in yards on the ground with 48. That talent might come into play Saturday, as the Longhorn defensive line, while not the best in the Big 12, will be an improvement over MTSU’s.

Saban said that group could make things difficult for Alabama Saturday if it can’t block.

“They’ve got really good energy and enthusiasm,” Saban said. “They played really well last week. It’s a very good defensive team. It would be challenging for us to be able to get movement on the people we need to get movement on so we can have some balance on offense. They’ll be challenges in pass protection as well.”

Texas comes in ranked No. 11 in the nation. After Saturday’s game, the Crimson Tide will likely have more of a true picture of where its offense excels and needs to improve.

“The challenge is, you gotta protect, you gotta be able to get open and you gotta be able to throw the ball accurately when it all happens so that’s what we’re focused on trying to get our guys to do,” Saban said.

The Crimson Tide and Longhorns are scheduled to kick off at 6 p.m. Saturday at Bryant-Denny Stadium. The game will be aired on ESPN.

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