The profession of being a coach of a football team requires a person to have both strong character and strong mind in order to direct the whole team to success by provoking their desire to fight and be the winners. There are a few coaches in sports that are characterized as the unsparing, unsmiling and unstoppable people (Warren). At the same time, there are not many coaches who while being fanatically involved in football would be ready to leave their studies and interest to go back home and help a mother run the gas station that was left after the father's death from a heart attack in 1973 (Edwards).
Sometimes, he is called "Devil's Sympathy" and sometimes he is a person "who does not have philosophy and need to wear a tie" (Warren 1). However , if that was an inseparable condition for his team to win the match, he would wear it every day (Edwards). This essay is about Nick Saban, a coach of the national champion Alabama Crimson Tide (Warren).
Edwards is convinced that despite the fact that Nick Saban does not look like a man who is interested in many other things apart from football, he has got more outstanding personal features than he usually demonstrates. His wife explains the reason why he may be often misunderstood. It is usually due to his involvement with too many things that are of great interest for him. Thus, he may seem to be just not very interested in communicating with others (Edwards).
Nick Saban's Personal Life
Nick Lou Saban was born on October 31, 1951 in Fairmont, West Virginia. His parents are Mary and Nick Lou Saban Senior. His father owned a restaurant called Saban's Dairy King and a gas station called Saban's Service. When growing up, Nick used to pump gas at his father's service station that was located down a hill from their family house (Edwards). Nick, a young man of Croatian origin, grew up and graduated from high school near the Monongah, a small community that is located about 90 miles south of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in West Virginia.
On December 18, 1971, he married Terry Saban, who also comes from West Virginia. They have a son Nicholas and a daughter Kristen. Nick is of Roman Catholic confession and is characterized as a devoted religious man who attends the mass before his games.
The coach graduated from Kent State University in the state of Ohio. During his student years, he played defensive back for the football team. Saban is an owner of a vacation home on Lake Burton, which is located in the North-East of the state of Georgia, where he enjoys spending his leisure time with the family.
In the United States, Saban is considered as one of the highest paid college or professional football coaches. In 2008, he appeared on the cover of Forbes magazine as "The Most Powerful Coach in Sports" (Burke). Moreover, Saban had a chance to play himself in The Blind Side movie. At the same time, the movie Nick Saban: Gamechanger was released in 2010.
Apart from his football activities, Saban and his wife Terry devote a lot of time to the community service. They are the co-founders of the Nick's Kids Fund. The mission of this institution is to help mentally-challenged children. They established it when Saban began his career of the head coach.
Professional Experience of Nick
While being a football coach, Saban currently holds a position of a head coach at the University of Alabama. He used to serve as a head coach of Miami Dolphins and other football teams in such universities as Michigan State University, Louisiana State University, and the University of Toledo.
During the path of his coaching career, Saban has been both an assistant and a head coach. According to Mason, he was assisting the following six teams: Syracuse in 1977, West Virginia in 1978-1980, Ohio State in 1980-1981. Then he switched to the US Naval Academy in 1982 and worked there until he became involved in coaching Houston Oilers in 1988 for two years. The last place where he worked as an assistant was the Cleveland Browns during 1991-1994.
His career as a head coach started at the University of Toledo, in 1990, where he was coaching in Michigan State University from 1995 till 1999. Another five years were spent in Louisiana State University (1999-2004) with further four years dedicated to Miami Dolphins in 2004-2007. He started working for the University of Alabama in 2007 and remains the coach of Crimson Tide football team until present days (Mason).
Saban is a milieu of championships and awards. His list includes four National Championships (2003, 2009, 2011, 2012), four Southeastern Conference Championships (2001, 2003, 2009, 2012). There were also six Southeastern Conference Championships Western Division Titles (2001-2003, 2008-2009, 2012).
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His awards include double and triple honors of being a coach of the year at local and national levels and other awards such as Home Depot Coach of the Year Award (2008), Liberty Mutual Coach of the Year Award (2008), Amos Alonzo Stagg Coaching Award (2010) among many others that make him a vivid coach and a person who knows how to serve his community.
Significant Facts about Saban
Apart from the fact that the football program of Alabama University had about $55 million of revenues and about $32 million of profit, the latter is used to pay off the athletic department at the amount of $130 million of debt for their capital improvements. It was a very smart choice of the University of Alabama to hire Nick Saban not only because football finances about got eighty percent for the athletic department, which includes such nonrevenue sports such as softball and swimming, but it also returned millions of dollars to the academic programs of the university.
The presence of Saban helps the university academics to attract stronger applicants as they decide to choose the University of Alabama because of strong football base with Saban being a coach. Thus, according to Burke, the percentage of the students enrolled in the top quarter of their high school class goes up with every year. Such attractiveness of the university was achieved because of the presence of a coach and his caliber; they both recruit better students and, thus, are able to raise more money (Burke).
There are many stereotypes that in order to become a successful coach, one needs to be a narrow-minded sportsman, who is concentrated only on the success of the team. The example of Nick Saban proved a totally opposite side: a person can combine their job aptitudes and balance personal life. As a result of his work devotion, he can be a number one coach of the year at national level, and successfully conduct his community services with his wife. He can be a great philosopher who seems to be far away from others with his thoughts, and, at the same time, have a particular sense of humor when his fans are waiting for Saban to wear a tie every day, so his team can definitely win more and more.
