Nick Saban has experienced unprecedented highs across his coaching career at Alabama, but when speaking at the Irondale Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast last week, he revealed one of his lowest moments as a coach.
Saban told a hilarious story about his most humiliating loss which came against ULM during his first year as the Crimson Tide’s head coach.
“If you remember back to the first year we were at Alabama, we lost to ULM,” Saban said according to AL.com. “You may not even know what that stands for — University of Louisianna-Monroe. It was the most humiliating defeat maybe of my entire career.”
Alabama lost to Louisianna-Monroe 21-14 in front of its home crowd inside Bryant-Denny Stadium as it went on to finish the year with a record of 7-6.
“I think we had five guys suspended by the NCAA,” Saban said. “We had three more guys suspended for disciplinary reasons. We played horrible in the game. I was almost ashamed of how we represented the university and the program. We fumbled the ball six times. So, we ended up getting beat in the game. Everybody’s disappointed. Fans are disappointed. Coaches are disappointed. Players are disappointed.
“But when you’re the coach, you have to win the locker room after the game and try and inspire the guys when they didn’t perform very well. Then you have to go to the recruiting room and tell recruits that it’s not really going to be this way in the future.”
What was once a great disappointment can now be looked back on with a bit more humor from Saban who rounded out the tale by recounting a hilarious interaction at the gas station following the loss.
“So then, after all of that, after all that humiliation, I get in my car to drive home, and I don’t have any gas in the car. So, now I’ve got to stop as a self-serve, put some gas in the car, and I used to wear my LSU national championship ring.
“So, I go to pay the guy, and the guy says, ‘Wow, what’s that ring?’ And I say, that’s a national championship ring. And we’re going to do the same thing here at Alabama.
“And the guy looks at me and says, ‘We’ll never do it as long as that Nick Saban is coach.'”
Thankfully for Saban and Alabama, the following 17 years were filled with historic success which included six national championships.
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Patrick Dowd is a Reporter for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter, via Pat_Dowd77
