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Alabama running back Derrick Henry (27) burns clock during the fourth quarter of the Alabama at Tennessee football game, Saturday, October 25, 2014, at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tenn. (Vasha Hunt/vhunt@al.com)
TUSCALOOSA, Alabama -- Alabama had so many scholarship running backs last season, two never even took a snap.
One year later, that's the sort of problem the Crimson Tide wished it had heading into its second bye of the season.
Dee Hart's transfer to Colorado State and Alvin Kamara's departure left Alabama with two fewer running backs by the start of spring football. Five-star freshman Bo Scarbrough failed to qualify.
Two quarters into October, junior speedster Kenyan Drake went down with a broken leg. Freshman safety Ronnie Clark, who joined the group to provide depth, tore his Achilles tendon and is out for the season. T.J. Yeldon, who dealt with a minor injury in September and has been limited at practice throughout the month, missed the fourth quarter against Tennessee and isn't practicing this week because of an injured foot. Redshirt freshman Tyren Jones, who has looked promising in mop-up duty, missed a couple of games with an injured finger and is currently suspended for unspecified reasons.
That's left Alabama with Derrick Henry and Altee Tenpenny as its only scholarship running backs at its first two practices of the bye week. Fullback Jalston Fowler, who has plenty of running back experience, has increased his snaps at the position after receiving his first two carries of the year against Tennessee. The group is thin enough that freshman walk-on Buddy Pell of Mountain Brook was near the front of the line for drills at Wednesday's practice.
Never has Henry, who is second on the team with 530 yards and four touchdowns, been in a bigger position to lead than now.
"Derrick has done a really nice job for us," Alabama coach Nick Saban said Wednesday. "As he gets more experience, I think his awareness of doing things when he doesn't have the ball continues to improve. That makes him a much more complete player."
Henry took over for Yeldon and helped Alabama milk more than 7 minutes of clock on a fourth-quarter drive that ended with a Fowler fumble at the Vols' 1-yard line. Henry, who finished with a team-high 78 yards, ran eight times on the possession. One quarter earlier, his 28-yard touchdown run capped an Alabama drive that stymied Tennessee's momentum.
He'll have a week's worth of first-team snaps before Yeldon returns to practice.
"I thought he did a really nice job of running the ball," Saban said. "He's a big, strong guy. When he hits the holes and reads the plays right, he's very, very effective and difficult to tackle.
"We're going to need him and all of our players on offense to finish strong if we're going to have success against some of the better defenses that we're going to play coming up here."