Everything Nick Saban Said at the Nick’s Kids Golf Tournament

The Alabama head coach touched on the Nick's Kids Foundation, Alabama's recent summer additions, NIL and more.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — The Saban family has left a huge mark on the city of Tuscaloosa and the state of Alabama over the last 15 years both on and off the field. Their primary work off the field comes through the Nick's Kids Foundation, which has donated over $11 million to organizations around the Tuscaloosa community. 

Thursday afternoon, the foundation held its annual golf tournament which gave Nick Saban an opportunity to speak to the media for the last time until SEC Media Days on July 19. He touched on everything from SEC Spring Meetings to Alabama's newest transfers. Here's what he had to say:

Nick Saban Full Transcript- June 2, 2022

Opening statement

“It’s exciting to be here. There’s a lot of great people who support Nick’s Kids. Obviously, Miss Terry does a fabulous job of helping a lot of people. I think we’ve given over 10 million dollars and done a lot of other things that have helped create opportunities for young people and hopefully make the quality of life a little better for them as well.

“There’s a lot of great people here, and we’re always excited to do this. It’s a lot of fun. I wish you all could join us, but ya’ll know how it is.”

On if he got what he wanted to get accomplished during SEC Spring Meetings

“I think there’s probably three main topics, scheduling being one of them. And I think that’s really an issue relative to having two new teams coming in the league in 2025. So there was a lot of good conversation about it. I think that no decision was made, but a lot of positive dialouge.

“Name image and likeness is always a big topic of conversation. I think how we put guardrails on this whole process, I think there’s been a lot of unintended consequences. I think the concept’s great for players. We all want players to do as well as they can while they’re going to college and still be able to stay focused on developing their careers on and off the field to the degree they need to, so that’s always a huge thing. And how it impacts recruiting.

“I think those are some of the topics. We always go through rule changes, and the big rule change this year is probably about blocking below the waist. There’s some changes in that, but other than that it’s pretty status quo.”

On recent incoming transfers

“They came to school on Tuesday. We had a team meeting last night on Wednesday. Today’s their first workout day. So other than saying that they’re there and I saw them in the team meeting… Obviously, we wouldn't have recruited them if we didn’t think they’d help our team in some way.

“We’re still always trying to develop our team with young players in the program. If we’re going to take guys out of the portal, we’re going to take guys who can help impact and affect the team immediately. We’ll just have to wait and see how it goes this summer and how those guys develop, learn, grow in the system. But we’re hopeful that they’ll all add some value.”

On what the new incoming transfers bring individually

“Tyler Steen has started lots of games in this league. [Tyler] Harrell was a big-play receiver for his team. We needed somebody that could add that. We added the tight end from junior college [Miles Kitselman] that adds depth to that position.”

Photo | Bryan Lynn-USA TODAY Sports

Tyler Steen

Photo | Jamie Rhodes-USA TODAY Sports

Tyler Harrell

Miles Kitselman's Instagram, @milesk_44

Miles Kitselman

On if all the freshmen were able to make it to campus

“Everybody’s here.”

On how NIL affects hiring assistant coaches potentially from the NFL

“I think that people don’t look at those circumstances when they’re making professional decisions, this is just my opinion. I think if they think they can create great value for themselves and accomplish the great goals and aspirations they have for themselves, then they’re going to continue to make those decisions based on the best opportunities professionally. There’s always been adaptations and changes that we’ve had to make in college football. They have to make them in the NFL. They have to make them in the NBA. And those circumstances are all things that they have to adapt to.

"And I’m sure that we’ve got a lot of great people trying to create opportunities that are going to be beneficial to players, but also to keep a competitive balance in college athletics. There will be transparency in what people are able to do and how we can not allow this to be something that gives people opportunities to create advantages for themselves that are beyond the competitive development of players.”

Does Alabama have programs in place for the players to best understand and utilize NIL?

“We’re doing that whether it’s relative to agent education, or whether it’s Name, Image and Likeness opportunities, whether it’s how they have to pay taxes on the money they make and things like this. All those things are educational things that we try to make sure our players have a good understanding of.”

What the young LSU fan offered Nick Saban at Spring Meetings in Destin

“He made an offer for me to retire or come back to LSU— one or the other. But I think LSU has a good coach, and they have a lot of good players. We’ve had a lot of competitive games with them, and I’m sure it’ll be no different in the future when it comes to competition versus LSU.”

On longtime Alabama strength and conditioning assistant Terry Jones

“Terry has great relationships with the players. I think that’s something that’s always really, really important, even more important now with the new culture that we have in college athletics. He’s always made a huge impact with the players relative to his knowledge and experience, and he’s always been a great guy to have around.”