Kirby Smart explains why he left Alabama to challenge Nick Saban at Georgia

The Nick Saban coaching tree branches out so far, his former assistants are now beating him for national championships. Current Georgia head coach Kirby Smart defeated Saban and the Alabama Crimson Tide 33-18 in the 2022 College Football Playoff National Championship game.

Smart has been building an empire of his own in Athens since taking over the head coaching job in 2016. Prior to that, however, Smart was on Saban’s staff as defensive coordinator from 2008 to 2015.

“I thought it was the next step,” Smart said about leaving Alabama. “You know, I had great nine years there at the University of Alabama and get the opportunity to come home to my alma mater, It was a no-brainer, right? This is a top 10 job in the country — top-five job in the country.”

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It wasn’t as though Smart wasn’t a well-known coach. He won four national titles with the Crimson Tide, was named AFCA Assistant Coach of the Year in 2012 and the Broyles Award in 2009.

Saban, as he does so often, was grooming Smart for his first head coaching job in his 16-year career on the sidelines, and it paid off. His 66-15 overall record, six bowl wins, an SEC Championship, two CFP appearances and a national championship since 2015 give him one of the best resumes of first-time head coaches in the country.

“So when I got to go back [to Georgia] I knew that the race in the SEC is brutal. It’s brutal recruiting in the SEC, coaching in the SEC. But you get to coach guys like this,” Smart said about his 2022 draft class. “And I knew taking on that role that we’d have to get through the SEC gauntlet, but you get through that sometimes the playoffs are even easier. And and that’s what we’ve been able to do when we get into the playoffs. It’s like playing an SEC team every week.”

That mentality has given the SEC as a whole the last three CFP titles and five overall since the playoffs’ inception in 2014.

Smart will no doubt keep the ball rolling following his national championship win, hauling in yet another top-five recruiting class for 2022, according to the On3 Consensus, while also filling in the gaps left by players in Georgia’s the seemingly never-ending Georgia draft class.