Rocky Topics: Was Steve Spurrier greater than Nick Saban?
Many people already regard Nick Saban as the greatest coach of all time. But has he been the greatest coach of his era?
Photo by Jeff Kern, courtesy of creativecommons.org. No changes made.
[title_box title=”Rocky Topics: Was Steve Spurrier greater than Nick Saban?”]
Co-written by Jake Nichols
This week on Rocky Topics, staff writers Dalton King and Jake Nichols debate who is the better legendary SEC coach — Nick Saban or Steve Spurrier?
King: Championships and recruiting are the prized possessions of college football. Those who dominate in the offseason at bringing in the country’s best prospects and those who finish the season as the national champion are the elite members of college football. Over the years, Nick Saban has become the definition of success in the sport of college football. Compared to Spurrier, I believe Saban is the obvious choice in a debate of who is the better coach.
Nichols: Dalton, you make a valid point in saying that championships play a part in making college football’s most dominating teams and coaches into what and who they are. Spurrier won five SEC championships as head coach of the Florida Gators, but what truly makes the “Head Ball Coach” better is his ability to transform any and every team he coached into a winning program. His offensive brilliance turned a formerly-mediocre team like South Carolina into a contender, while Saban has only been able to build on the more-than-solid foundations laid by Bear Bryant and Gene Stallings at Alabama.
King: Spurrier’s track record of building up programs is definitely a solid point and makes for a great resumé as a challenged winner. In 2004, when Saban left LSU for the NFL and in 2007 when the Alabama job opened, Spurrier wasn’t interested in either job. He didn’t want to go to a historically great program that had won championships. He wanted the challenge of winning where winning wasn’t the culture. This is a very respectable decision for the elite coach he was, but I do not believe it makes him the better coach.
Let’s be careful to not portray Saban as only a winner in ideal situations who didn’t take on challenging jobs. When Saban got to LSU in 2000, the Tigers were coming off two consecutive losing seasons (4-7 in 1998, 3-8 in 1999). In his first season at the helm, LSU finished 8-4. The next year? The Tigers beat No. 2 Tennessee in the SEC Championship and went on to win the Sugar Bowl, finishing with a 10-3 record. By 2004, Saban and LSU won a national championship. He inherited a declining program and created a winning culture immediately.
The same goes for when he arrived at Alabama in 2007. The legendary program hadn’t won a national title since 1992. When Saban arrived at Alabama, the Tide had gone 6-6 the season before. In his second season, Saban led the Tide to a 12-0 regular season record. And in 2009, they finished 14-0 as national champions. Now, Saban finds himself only one championship behind legendary coach Bear Bryant with five national titles.
Nichols: While Saban has proven himself as a talented coach at multiple schools, let’s not forget the impact Spurrier made at all three of the programs he led during such a storied career. While at Duke (his first college head coaching position), Spurrier revived the Blue Devils, formerly regarded as the worst team in the ACC, to the tune of a 20-13-1 overall record. While at Duke, Spurrier also led the Blue Devils to a share of the 1989 ACC Championship, as well as Duke’s first bowl game since the 1960 Cotton Bowl when it faced Texas Tech in the All-American Bowl.
Spurrier then led Heisman-winning quarterback Danny Wuerffel and the Florida Gators to the 1996 national championship. Many believe Spurrier would have achieved another title earlier in his time as Florida’s head coach had NCAA violations from the previous coach’s time at the helm not plagued the earlier part of his career. South Carolina reversed its downward spiral when he took the helm. In fact, the hit that former Gamecocks defensive lineman Jadeveon Clowney laid on Michigan running back Vincent Smith in the 2013 Outback Bowl perfectly captures the impact Spurrier made in college football.
He rocked the world of every opponent in his path with reckless abandon and had offensive schemes designed so impeccably, they were almost impossible to stop. Over his head-coaching tenure, Spurrier coached his teams to a record 15 straight seasons with 5-game win streaks. That’s something no other coach in college football has ever done. Spurrier revolutionized the sport by using a quick wit and an even quicker offensive mind.
Featured image by Jeff Kern
Edited by Cody McClure
Dalton, a firm believer that sporting events are best spent on Twitter, is an Assistant Sports Editor for TNJN and a sophomore studying Journalism at the University of Tennessee. Two of his favorite pastimes include beating his roommates at 2k and remaining in awe of the amount of stories fellow editor David Bradford writes. Twitter: @dk_writes
