Nick Saban made three NFL stops over his coaching career. Houston was the first.
Nick Saban will go down as one of the greatest college football coaches ever. The stats speak for themselves–seven National titles, 10 SEC titles, and 14 SEC Western Division titles are among his honors. Only Saban and Alabama’s Bear Bryant have won SEC championships at two different schools, and only Saban has won national championships at two different Football Subdivision schools.
After Nick Saban served as a college assistant at various schools, including Navy, West Virginia, and Michigan State, Jerry Glanville and the Houston Oilers came calling. Saban coached defensive backs there in 1988 and 1989.
The Oilers were good defensively, but remember they were pros, not college players, and Saban’s approach didn’t always settle well with pro-level players. Safety Keith Bostic was known to fall asleep during film study, and when Saban called him out, Bostic wrestled him to the ground before the staff intervened and split them apart.
Saban left the Oilers after the 1989 season to take the head job at Toledo, but he didn’t stay there long. By 1991, he was back in the pros as Defensive Coordinator for the Cleveland Browns. There, he coached under Bill Belichick before heading back to college as head coach of the Michigan State Spartans. He’d leave East Lansing a few years later to take over as head coach of the LSU Tigers, where he won a national championship. After another flirtation with the pros, this time with the Miami Dolphins, Saban left for Tuscaloosa, where he has remained til this day.
I definitely know the name Nick Saban. What I didn’t know is how much he bounced around to so many different teams. Thank you Matthew Paris for this info.
Ron, the words “bounced around” don’t fit this situation. Saban wanted to work under a variety of head coaches with different philosophies and approaches. He applied what he learned as a head coach.