Ole Miss' Lane Kiffin 'extremely grateful' to Nick Saban for time together at Alabama
As is the case with many interpersonal relationships, the history between Nick Saban and Lane Kiffin is complicated.
The two have drastically different personalities, with Saban more guarded and stern and Kiffin more brash and mercurial. Saban is a defensive mastermind, while Kiffin is an offensive whiz.
For three seasons, those contrasts were put on display every college football Saturday as Kiffin served as Saban’s offensive coordinator at Alabama. The current Ole Miss coach helped the Crimson Tide to three College Football Playoff berths before leaving ahead of the 2017 CFP championship game, a few weeks after he had accepted the head-coaching position at Florida Atlantic.
As the two prepare to face off again as head coaches — No. 12 Alabama (2-1, 0-0 SEC) hosts Kiffin’s 16th-ranked Ole Miss team (3-0, 0-0 SEC) Saturday at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa, Alabama — another, sometimes less-discussed side of the relationship between the two men was revealed.
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When speaking with the assembled media Monday for his weekly news conference, Kiffin expressed a sense of respect and gratitude toward his former boss:
“I think sometimes with time those things happen, that you continue to be appreciate of the opportunity that he gave,” Kiffin told the assembled reporters. “But not just that. People give people opportunities all the time, but the things I learned from him defensively, things I learned from him organizationally, discipline … I’m extremely grateful to him and he really helped me at a really challenging time in my life.
"Like they kind of say sometimes, I guess you don’t really figure out yourself sometimes until you’re kind of torn down and have to rebuild yourself. I’m grateful for him for being part of that process.”
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The history between Nick Saban and Lane Kiffin
Kiffin arrived at Alabama in 2014 at a professional nadir.
He was once widely hailed as an offensive wunderkind, accepting the Oakland Raiders’ head-coaching position at 31 years old before moving back to the college level, where he coached college football powerhouses Tennessee and USC. But five games into the fourth season of his uneven tenure with the Trojans, who were 3-2 and coming home from a 62-41 loss at Arizona State, Kiffin was fired on the tarmac at a private airport in Los Angeles.
With an opening at offensive coordinator following Doug Nussmeier’s departure to Michigan in 2014, Saban turned to Kiffin and offered him the chance to resurrect his career.
He was able to do just that, transforming what had been a staid, albeit successful, Alabama offense into something more dynamic and up-tempo. Under Kiffin, the Crimson Tide never averaged fewer than 35 points per game and, behind Heisman Trophy winner Derrick Henry, won the national championship in 2015.
That partnership wasn’t without some memorable clashes. Perhaps none was more famous than a 2016 incident in which an irate Saban was seen yelling at Kiffin on the sidelines late in a 38-10 victory against Western Kentucky after the Hilltoppers capitalized on an Alabama fumble to score a late touchdown.
After leading the Crimson Tide’s offense in a 24-7 win against Washington in the College Football Playoff semifinals — and after he had already been named Florida Atlantic’s coach — Kiffin was gone, with both Saban and Kiffin describing the abrupt exit as a mutual agreement.
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Nick Saban and Lane Kiffin as SEC coaching peers
Since being hired at Ole Miss in 2019, Kiffin has once again become a presence in Saban’s life: not as a co-worker, but an SEC West adversary. They’ve faced off three times since Kiffin took over in Oxford, with Alabama winning each matchup, including a 30-24 victory last season.
Kiffin will still occasionally poke the proverbial bear, as he did on Sunday when he said it appeared that defensive backs coach Travaris Robinson had taken over defensive play-calling duties for the Crimson Tide (Saban has since refuted the claim).
Beyond that gamesmanship, though, is an unshakeable admiration and appreciation for Saban and what he has built.
“For him to do what he does is unbelievable,” Kiffin said in May on Sirius XM SEC Radio. “And then for what he did for me personally, it was unbelievable. So it’s kind of like a family member, where I can joke about him or something. But if someone else does, it really pisses me off.”
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Ole Miss' Lane Kiffin 'extremely grateful' to Alabama's Nick Saban
