The coach’s blueprint has left an imprint on the entire sport.
BUILDING A BETTER BAMA
Nick Saban’s imprint is most apparent in the conference he has dominated. It’s not just that everyone in the SEC is chasing Alabama. In many cases, teams are trying to re-create the Tide.
Four of Saban’s former assistants are now SEC head coaches (Jimbo Fisher, Kirby Smart, Will Muschamp and Jeremy Pruitt), and nine of the conference’s 13 programs have coaches who once worked for him. One of the programs that doesn’t, Arkansas, hired a former Saban player personnel staffer this off season as one of its two recruiting coordinators.
As his apprentices hop on the SEC coaching carousel because of Bama’s success, Saban’s rivals have in turn lost their rides. When Mark Richt was shoved out the door at Georgia in 2015 after 15 seasons and a 145–51 record, Saban told reporters, “I don’t know what the world’s coming to in our profession.” But truth be told, Saban is precisely what has turned his profession upside down.
Like Les Miles at LSU and so many coaches before him, Richt was fired because he wasn’t Saban. He never so much as sniffed a national title, let alone five in a decade, and after three losses to Alabama in his last three tries, Georgia seemed to think he never would.
This story is from the August 20, 2018 edition of ESPN The Magazine.
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This story is from the August 20, 2018 edition of ESPN The Magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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