Gus Malzahn reveals when Nick Saban offered him Alabama football’s OC job

Nov 24, 2018; Tuscaloosa, AL, USA; Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Nick Saban talks with Auburn Tigers head coach Gus Malzahn prior to the game at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Marvin Gentry-USA TODAY Sports

Gus Malzahn could have been the offensive coordinator at Alabama in 2008. Let that sink in. 

The dynamic offensive mind recently announced his retirement from college football, finishing his career at Florida State by winning five games but capturing a blowout victory over Alabama in the season opener, and it was revealed in an interview with On3’s Chris Low that one of Alabama football’s biggest rivals almost joined the Crimson Tide.

Malzahn mentioned that Nick Saban reached out to him in 2008 about becoming offensive coordinator at Alabama in Saban’s second season. 

Malzahn finished up his first season as an assistant head coach and offensive coordinator at Tulsa, and that’s when he received the call from Saban.

“I just remember thinking, ‘That’s pretty cool. Here I am, an old high school coach, and Nick Saban is calling me about a job,’” Malzahn said.

Tulsa put up video game numbers in Malzahn’s first season as the offensive coordinator there, and that caught the eye of Alabama coaches and possibly recruits too.

“We had the best offense in the country (averaging 543.9 yards per game), and I remember Julio Jones was waiting to see who the offensive coordinator was going to be,” Malzahn said.

When asked why he did not go to Alabama, he said “I don’t know. That’s a great question. I’d just come from Arkansas, which was my first year in college coaching and had only been at Tulsa for a year. I guess I wanted to do my own thing.”

He eventually went on to become the offensive coordinator at Auburn in 2009, and the rest is history. 

“But that was one of the things that made my time at Auburn so special, being there when Nick was and going against the best to ever do it as your rival,” Malzahn said. “It was a pretty unique situation, and I loved it. There is no rivalry like that one, and it helped motivate all of us. We had kids who believed and understood the rivalry, too. We always had a chip on our shoulder, and when we played them, we expected to whip them.”

Malzahn beat Alabama and Saban three times between 2013 and 2019. When you take those wins and add his victory over Alabama as the Auburn offensive coordinator in 2010 and the 2025 victory over Alabama while calling plays at Florida State, Malzahn has beaten the Crimson Tide more in the past two decades than any other coach.

Perhaps the fun part of this discussion is thinking about how different things would have been if Malzahn took the job at Alabama.

He might have chosen to eat at the Waffle House on The Strip after a win in Bryant-Denny Stadium. 

The biggest hypothetical to ponder about is how Auburn would have looked in a few Iron Bowls if Malzahn never went to Auburn in the first place. Would there have been no Kick Six? Would Alabama have gone to another National Championship with Malzahn calling plays? Would Malzahn later become a head coach somewhere else in the later years of his career?

One can only dream about what college football would have looked like if Malzahn went to Alabama in 2008. Ultimately, after the 2013 loss to Auburn, Alabama brought in Lane Kiffin to modernize the Crimson Tide’s offense.

Eventually, Auburn moved on from Malzahn after a few down seasons, but the Tigers have failed to hire a coach that’s done a job better than Malzahn thus far. The most important stat is that the Tigers have not won the Iron Bowl in this current decade.