Nick Saban returns to Tuscaloosa, attends Alabama basketball game

After Kalen DeBoer’s inaugural news conference, former Alabama football coach Nick Saban made his first public appearance in Tuscaloosa on Saturday. He went to a men’s basketball game at Coleman Coliseum against Texas A&M.

Seated close to the Tide’s bench were Saban, his wife Terry Saban, and a number of former Alabama basketball players, such as Herb Jones, Noah Clowney, Noah Gurley, and Antoine Pettway. Pettway participated in a halftime ceremony commemorating the 2004 Elite Eight squad. He is currently the head coach at Kennesaw State.

In his pregame radio interview with the Crimson Tide Sports Network, coach Nate Oats stated that Saban also addressed the men’s basketball team on Friday.

“Always go back to his process,” Oats remarked, elaborating on how much he and his players talk about winning the SEC. “To be very honest, your attention is diverted from what you should be doing today the more you discuss about championships. In the SEC, they are aware of our current position. I gave a quick overview of our current situation, but I focused much of the discussion on what has to be done today to improve upon yesterday’s state of affairs. If you do that, I believe everything else—the championships and everything else—takes care of itself.”

After retiring, Saban has been spending time at his Florida home and took part in the Pro-Am earlier this month as part of the PGA Tour’s

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Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne evaluates Kalen DeBoer’s first month as Tide coach

There has “probably never been a transition like this in the history of college sports,” Greg Byrne said of Alabama moving from Nick Saban to Kalen DeBoer.

Despite some staff and player change in Kalen DeBoer’s first month as Alabama’s coach, Greg Byrne, the athletic director at Alabama, gave a good assessment of DeBoer’s work behind the scenes thus far.

Byrne stated on Friday on Tide 100.9, “I can tell already that Coach DeBoer is really smart and is really thoughtful.” “In today’s world, we all demand answers and reactions right away, but in actuality, I can tell that he’s very thoughtful in the way he approaches the staff, the roster, and building relationships with the children. It has gone really nicely, I can assure you of that. That makes us happy.”

There “probably has never been a transition like this in the history of college sports,” according to Byrne.

“Not to say they weren’t equally huge transitions — they were,” added Byrne. “But this is a tremendously difficult adjustment for [DeBoer] to leave Coach Saban and what he means to our university, college football, and everything else between now. However, I’ve been really impressed with his approach since the day he arrived and how he has embraced Coach Saban and our culture at Alabama. I believe he did an excellent job with it. I’m looking forward to seeing him practice with the squad for spring ball as well.”

Alabama has a “opportunity to have a very good culture” under DeBoer, according to Byrne, after having a “incredible culture” under Saban. Byrne expressed his admiration for DeBoer’s history of cultivating a culture.

“One of the things we talked about and I think it’s been pretty public, a lot of what I said is we had a very hopefully thoughtful plan on the transition and trying to manage the roster, knowing that we wouldn’t necessarily bat 1.000,” Byrne stated. “Reminding the young men and their families that Alabama is a very special place is one of our priorities, but we also realize that this won’t change. Although the head coach is currently in a different role, Coach Saban left a foundation that puts us in a great position to build upon going forward, and we made sure to emphasize this to the young men and their families in our messaging. You could observe

“It goes without saying that we’re a very desirable university to attend given who we are and what we stand for. However, I also couldn’t just stand here and declare that this would undoubtedly occur. You should also consider the various preparations you may need to have in case you need to take action.”