124-Win Head Coach Dealt Reality Check After Disappointing College Football Season

Nick Saban spent 28 seasons as an FBS head coach, with stops at Toledo, Michigan State, LSU and most notably Alabama before retiring in January 2024.

He stepped away after a run that included seven claimed national championships (one at LSU, six at Alabama), 297 career wins, the third-most in major college football history, and an unparalleled modern dynasty in Tuscaloosa.

His Alabama tenure (2007–2023) featured nine SEC titles, nearly two dozen top-10 finishes, multiple national coach of the year honors and sustained NFL draft production that cemented his legacy as one of the sport’s all-time greats.

In short, Saban didn’t just win; he institutionalized a standard with elite recruiting pipelines, position-by-position development and relentless process-driven game management that defined what championship infrastructure looks like in the College Football Playoff era.

Just two days after Saban announced his retirement, Alabama hired Kalen DeBoer, a coach coming off a national runner-up season at Washington and a résumé built on winning at every stop.

But Saban’s towering legacy is also the reason DeBoer has faced immediate scrutiny, including recent criticism from ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith.

“I’m not a fan of Kalen DeBoer as the successor to Nick Saban. I have no problem with him as a football coach,” Smith said on an edition of The Paul Finebaum Show on SEC Network on Monday, adding another layer of pressure as DeBoer enters his third season in Tuscaloosa.

Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Kalen Deboer. — Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Kalen Deboer looks on before the 2026 Rose Bowl | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

DeBoer built his resume from a dominant NAIA run at Sioux Falls to FBS stops at Fresno State and Washington, compiling a 124–20 overall record across 11 seasons. At Washington, he won back-to-back Pac-12 Coach of the Year awards, AP Coach of the Year honors in 2023 and guided the Huskies to the 2024 College Football Playoff national championship game.

His first two seasons at Alabama, however, have produced a 20–8 record (9–4 in 2024; 11–4 in 2025), including an SEC title-game appearance but culminating in a lopsided 38–3 Rose Bowl/CFP quarterfinal loss to No. 1 Indiana on Jan. 1, 2026.

Because Saban reset the championship standard in Tuscaloosa, expectations remain immediate and unforgiving. A 9–4 debut followed by an 11–4 campaign that ended in a blowout playoff defeat has opened the door to criticism.

The debate has centered largely on the program’s perceived step back from Saban’s peak, questions about in-game decision-making and schematic identity, and whether DeBoer’s dominant résumé outside the SEC translates fully at the sport’s most demanding level.

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