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It was Christion Jones’ two returns for touchdowns and Alabama’s special teams, not Frank Beamer’s Virginia Tech squad, which led Alabama to a 35-10 victory Saturday in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff game at the Georgia Dome. He became the first Alabama player since 1944 to score two non-offensive touchdowns in one game. That’s as far back as some of the records go.
“It’s every kid’s dream to come and do things like that but we have a 24-hour rule,” said Jones, who also caught a 38-yard touchdown pass. “We will put this game aside tomorrow and go to week two.”
The Hokies are known to have one of the pre-eminent special teams in college football because they have blocked 129 kicks in 323 games under Beamer, spawning the alliterative nickname.
They needed a few more at the Georgia Dome.
Instead, Jones turned the Hokies inside out with a 72-yard punt return for a touchdown in the first quarter before Alabama’s offense had a chance to take the field. He added a 94-yard kickoff return with 3:25 in the first half.
“If he keeps that up he’ll be playing the pros one day,” Alabama offensive lineman Anthony Steen said.
Jones finished with two kick returns for 109 yards and a touchdown, and four punt returns for 100 yards and a touchdown.
He said he was glad that Virginia Tech kept testing him, despite his success in the first half.
“You don’t want them to stop kicking to you when you have a good chance to take it back,” Jones said. “The blocking scheme was set up great each time. There were a couple of times they were blocking really well, and we could have had other great returns.”
The Tide weren’t bad on special teams during last year’s BCS championship season. Alabama was No. 22 in FBS with an average of 23.95 yards per kick return and one touchdown, scored by Jones against Mississippi for Alabama’s first since 2010. They were No. 44 with an average of 9.91 yards per punt return with no touchdowns.
Jones was slightly better than the team averages, carrying 10.2 yards per punt on 25 attempts and 27.2 per kick on 25 attempts into Saturday’s game.
Jones said that when reviewing film of Virginia Tech’s special teams, he thought he saw ways to score, but he said that usually happens anytime anyone scouts an opponent.
The punt return was pure speed. He said the team called a middle return and it was open.
“I saw what I saw, they were downfield blocking and I just went along with it,” he said.
Beamer said the punt coverage featured three new players on the right side, but he said that’s not an excuse.
“We’ve just got to get better,” he said. “We know how to cover. We’ve just got to get the job done.”
The kick return showed Jones’ speed and strength. He caught the kick at the 6-yard line and ran into a pile where he appeared to get stopped. But he kept pushing, popped out on the left of the pile and outraced Virginia Tech’s defenders down the sideline. The score pushed the Tide’s lead to 28-10 and left Beamer with his head in his hands on the sideline.
“Special teams are very, very important to Alabama, and so we just used that for momentum and that’s what we did tonight,” Jones said.
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