As Jalen Hurts gets ready to take the next step in his football career, the past several months have been able to give him time to reflect on the unbelievable journey that was his college football career.
From his beginnings at Alabama to his Heisman caliber ending at Oklahoma, Hurts’ unique career has left its mark on both these schools.
And since the draft process first began Hurts has done nothing but rain praise on his former head coach Nick Saban, who made him the first freshman to start for one of his Alabama teams.
“Nick Saban is a legendary guys, a stand up guy,” said Hurts during a virtual interview with the Houston television station KHOU-TV. “Just going to the University of Alabama, I decided to go there because there were a lot of similarities between me and him: the competitive nature, work ethic and drive we had to be successful and to be dominant.
“That drove me to go there. To see the relationship that we have is still maintained is pretty cool, to be a guy I always have there supporting me, he’ll always be a friend to me for sure.”
Hurts won the quarterback competition back in 2016 and was able to lead the Crimson Tide to a national championship game. After taking the team back to another one the following season, Hurts evidently lost the job to Tua Tagovailoa.
Even when he could walk away from the school immediately and go play for another school, Hurts decided to stay his junior season with Alabama which was met with much praise.
Following the season Hurts left for Oklahoma where he set career highs in passing touchdowns (32), rushing touchdowns(20), passing yards(3,851) and rushing yards (1,298).
“It was unprecedented waters,” said Hurts. “(Saban) felt like that was a good opportunity for me, I did as well and I kinda took that next step and we are where we are.”
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Patrick Dowd is a Reporter for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter, via Pat_Dowd77
