Nick Saban gives candid response about advantages, disadvantages of facing former assistants

Nick Saban has had plenty of luck against his former assistants. The Alabama head coach has a 28-2 mark against coaches who worked for him in the past, with both losses coming in 2021 to Kirby Smart and Jimbo Fisher.

He also has a 1-0 record against Steve Sarkisian after the Crimson Tide fought off Texas in Austin a year ago. Saban will have a chance to get another victory over his former offensive coordinator this week when the Longhorns come to Tuscaloosa for a primetime showdown.

When he faces former assistants, Saban is going up against coaches who worked in the Alabama building and know the program well. However, he doesn’t consider that an advantage.

After all, those coaches likely learned some things under him, meaning he and the staff have a pretty good idea of what they’ll be up against.

“I guess the question would be does somebody else know more about what we know than what they know?” Saban said during his Wednesday press conference. “Yeah, is it an advantage to the other guy that he knows what we do? But we also know what they do. So I don’t know how you put that on a scale and say that it’s more advantageous to one person than the other.

“We always try to focus on what we’ve got to do with our players to try to get them to play good and not really worry too much about the other guys. But there could be some terminology things that if you don’t change it up, they might be able to take advantage of. And I think we’re aware of those things and trying to make sure that we don’t give them any advantages. But I think it kind of goes both ways.”

More on the relationship between Nick Saban, Steve Sarkisian

Sarkisian worked for Saban twice during his coaching career. He was an analyst in 2016 and took over as interim offensive coordinator for the bowl game after Lane Kiffin left for Florida Atlantic. After two years with the Atlanta Falcons, he returned to Tuscaloosa to become Saban’s offensive coordinator from 2019-20.

Sarkisian was a big part of the 2020 national championship team, winning the Broyles Award as the nation’s top offensive assistant as he helped Tua Tagovailoa develop into the No. 5 overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft. Then, in 2021, he became the latest in the long line of Saban assistants to become a head coach when Texas hired him.

He certainly left his mark on the Alabama program, and Saban acknowledged that Wednesday.

“I think Sark is one of the best coaches we’ve ever been around when it comes to offense,” Saban said. “He has great disposition with the players, he has great understanding of the game. He really understands defense and how to attack defenses, but he has some really good concepts on offense that are hard to defend.

“Understands how to present that in different ways so whatever you practiced, it doesn’t come up that way in the game, which makes it hard on our defensive players.”