Unavailable for the Alabama Crimson Tide's win at Kentucky, could the 2026 season debut of Noah Rogers and AK Dear come this upcoming Saturday against Florida State?
After missing Week 2, Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer updated the status of both Monday afternoon during his Week 3 press conference, as well as a few other Crimson Tide players currently dealing with injuries.
Among those was also Michael Carroll, Alabama's starting right guard who missed the Kentucky game, his first of the season.
“Michael, we’ll continue to work with him,” DeBoer said. “I feel confident that we’ll get there, and we’ll just kind of see how the week goes, but I think he’s heading in a good direction, and we hope to get him back.”
"AK, making good progress. I think
he was getting closer towards the end of the week. Again, reset, and we’ll see where he’s at today and then tomorrow get out there hopefully more on the practice field. He was doing some light practice, doing some things with us last week already. So, I think he expects, and his mindset’s been awesome with what he had injury-wise too, just the recovery and the response, his mindset’s helped him come back even quicker."
"Noah, we took him on the trip. He didn’t play. We weren’t expecting him to play, but that kind of gives an indication I think of how close we are. Again, we’ll see how the week of practice goes, but I would say in the next week or two, you can see him out there helping us out. So again, not 100% sure, but getting there.”
Both of Rogers and Dear are players who suffered injuries during spring and fall camp, respectively, that have kept them out up to this point. Jireh Edwards, another Alabama player who was injured during fall camp, made his 2026 season debut this past Saturday at Kentucky, making one tackle with a TFL.
With Carroll out against Kentucky, William Sanders moved over to right guard in place of the sophomore. At left guard, Mal Waldrep Jr. drew his first start in a Crimson Tide uniform.
The Crimson Tide will return to action this upcoming Saturday, Sept. 19, at home against Florida State. Kickoff is set for 3:30 p.m. ET on ABC.
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This article originally appeared on Roll Tide Wire: Kalen DeBoer updates status of injured Tide players vs. Florida State
