By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — After logging a career-high in snaps last week in a road loss to Tennessee, former Ocean Springs High standout Bray Hubbard is ready to take that next step at Alabama.
Hubbard is expected to get his first-ever start for Alabama on Saturday as the Crimson Tide hosts Missouri for Homecoming. The game is set for a 2:30 p.m., kickoff on ABC TV between No. 15 Alabama and the No. 21 at Bryant-Denny Stadium.
“I just don’t want to let my brothers down,” Hubbard, the former two-time Class 6A “Mr. Football” in the state of Mississippi at OSHS, told AL.Com on Tuesday. “At the end of the day, that’s what we’re all doing. The goal at the end of the day is zero points on the board for them.”

In his second season with the perennial national power, Hubbard finished the game against Tennessee with a career-high nine total tackles (second on the team) including a team-high five solo stops. He appears to be the guy at free safety moving forward for the Crimson Tide with the starter Keon Sabb out recovering from
“I feel like I played pretty well,” Hubbard said. “There are always things I can clean up on my side that I can do better to help my team out.”

Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer announced on Monday that Sabb “will be down for a while”.
Sabb started last week’s game and played 30 snaps, but he left the game twice before being shut down for the rest of the contest. Hubbard recorded a career-high 51 snaps.
The 6-foot-2, 204-pound safety drew high praise from both head coach Deboer and defensive coordinator Kane Wommack

Bray’s been working hard for this opportunity,” DeBoer said in his weekly press conference Monday afternoon. “He worked, not just last week, but every week to be ready, and we had no doubt he would be come Saturday when he was called upon. He’ll go out there again this week.
“Our team really believes in him,” DeBoer continued. “He does a lot of things on special teams. You can see it every day in practice. He’s been around the program, and now this is that time, that next-man-up mentality that we talk about, and that’s what it’s got to be. I know the high-level want-to that he has. I’m excited for his opportunity.”
Wommack said Hubbard has a ‘workmanlike’ attitude that helps him practice at a high level.
“ I thought Bray really did some great things in the game,” Wommack said Monday. “Obviously, he had the huge third down stop when we needed to go three-and-out and get the ball back to our offense. He made a helluva play and did some good things in the game.”

Wommack added that the young players in Alabama’s secondary have a sense of urgency. 
“They practice and play with a next man up mentality, understanding they have a chance at any moment to impact a game.” he said. “Certainly, I think our young guys, they seem to do that in practice. They have an urgency to get in. Bray Hubbard was a great example of that. Goes about his business workmanlike every single day and really prepares with an expectation that he’s going to go in, and he produced at a really high level. It’s certainly an opportunity for us to be able to point toward how critical practice habits have to show up one way or another in games.”
Wommack was referring to Hubbard’s play when he made a key stop on a third and seven situation late in the fourth quarter to give the ball back to the Crimson Tide’s offense with 2:23 to go, but Alabama turned it over on downs.
“I love Keon to death and Keon’s a warrior, man,” DeBoer concluded. There’s more things I want to say about Keon and what he did to go out there to try to help our football team, but there’s a next-man-up mentality and I’m excited about the opportunity that Bray has in front of him.”