Nick Saban Shares Insight Into Florida Gators HC Billy Napier
The Florida Gators are set to welcome their brand-new head coach, soon-to-be-former University of Louisiana-Lafayette HC Billy Napier on Sunday.
That will come just a day after ULL plays its conference title game against Appalachian State on Saturday, with Napier and his squad attempting to get their first title under the head coach's reign.
But, before that, his former boss, Alabama HC Nick Saban shared some insight into his former protege. Napier coached with Saban from 2013-16 as the Crimson Tide's wide receivers coach. He also served as an offensive analyst for the program in 2011.
Ahead of Alabama's SEC Championship game against the Georgia Bulldogs, Saban was asked about Napier, and what type of coach Florida will ultimately be getting.
"Billy did an outstanding job for us," Saban told members of the media earlier this week. "He was a very good coach. He was a great recruiter. He had great relationships with the players. He was a good teacher on the field. Hard worker, great character, good personality, very, very good family.
"I mean, there's nothing bad that I could think of to say about Billy Napier in terms of what he did here. No surprise to me, because he's a very well-organized guy and does due diligence before he makes any decision about anything. Very calculated in terms of how he tries to do things in a very positive way for his organization."
Napier would go on to become an offensive coordinator with Arizona State for a year before jumping over to the Sun Belt Conference to become ULL's head coach. Now, he's set to coach in the conference's championship game.
Since 2018, Napier has take the Ragin' Cajuns to a 39-12 record, including two other conference championship games. He's yet to win one but has an opportunity on Saturday to do so.
With his success at ULL, he's quickly parlayed that into an opportunity at one of the best conferences in college football, the Southeastern Conference with the Gators. That opportunity he's earned is no surprise to Saban, either.
"So not a surprise to me that he did really, really well when he got a head coaching job. I think he'll continue to do well."
Attention to detail and recruiting are the two must-haves for Florida this cycle. That much was seemingly lacking at times, especially recruiting, during Dan Mullen's tenure with the program.
With Napier now set to take the lead, expect recruiting to become a major focus and for his teams to at the very least be well-disciplined and organized, similarly to how Saban's Crimson Tide is.
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