BuddyBlog/ When We Weren’t Looking, Saban Surpassed Spurrier. HBC Honored By Nick For His Legacy.
Updated: May 6, 2022
HBC heads to Birmingham with Matthews and Doering to get Saban award. (UAA photo)
“I guess in the end I’ll be the winningest coach that wasn’t coaching at Alabama,” he said with self-amusement. “So that’s my record now, and I guess it ain’t too bad.”
By BUDDY MARTIN
GatorBaitMedia.com Editor
Funny thing about Steve Spurrier’s athletic accomplishments: They appear even bigger in the rearview mirror. He hasn’t coached a college game since 2015, yet his name, likeness and image are everywhere, bigger than ever.
From his name emblazoned across the stadium where he coached and played, to the statue on Lemerand where The Ambassador office resides, to the trophy case where the hardware is on display, as well remainder of his spoils from victory. The Spurrier’s Gridiron Grille Brand is in lights.
The way Sinatra owned New York … Elvis once owned Las Vegas … and Dolly still owns Pigeon Forge, Steve Spurrier is King of Gator Nation and his royalty rocks Gainesville. About the only legacy thing left is to do change the name of Gainesville to Spurrierville.
More validation came Spurrier’s way as he was bestowed a top honor from behind enemy lines. It seems his rivals and one-time enemies are starting to blow him kisses and send 21-gun salutes across his bow as they recognize the SEC’s third all-time winningest coach with their own personal honor.
The latest is The Nick Saban Legacy Award, proof that the HBC’s empire is still growing.
This was just another opportunity to pause and reflect on the remarkability of the HBC’s achievements. So many of them to covet. As I knew he would, when I inquired about his favorite, he begged off, struggling to come up with something other than a banal, “I guess it was the overall consistency.” That’s like saying you admire Elon Musk for his stock tips.
There’s a lot more impressive stuff. Like Spurrier flipping the script on game strategy in the SEC. Or maybe the incredible act of vanquishing Florida’s most hated rival Georgia, a team that had been dominating the Gators until he arrived in 1990.
And need I remind Steve how his Gators beat the Bulldogs 11 out of 12 seasons?
He didn’t miss a beat. “We also beat LSU 11 out of 12,” he shot back. “And LSU was probably a little better than Georgia back then. We beat pretty much everybody. Our record in the SEC was 87 and 14. But we did lose to Tennessee four times.”
After a bit of cajoling, he did admit that ranking second to Bear Bryant in SEC wins for a while was very special, but that he knew Saban would eventually catch him.
Everybody was still a bit fuzzy on how that SEC victory race and who was second to Bear, including our crack GatorBait Research Team. So I made a call to one of the key members of the SEC office and found out.
Saban spoke some kind words about Spurrier, who reciprocated with the most flattering comments ever about Alabama football. (University of Alabama photo)
The bad news is that Saban caught and passed Spurrier when we weren’t looking during the Pandemic. “It was during the Covid years,” SEC Director of Information Chuck Dunlap told me. “Prior to that Coach Spurrier was indeed No. 2 to Coach Bryant.”
Alabama’s 11 wins during an adjusted all-SEC schedule in 2020, plus the Tide’s eight league wins in 2021 pushed Saban to 140 conference victories, nine more than Spurrier’s 131. It was just a matter of time for Saban, although odds are against him overtaking Bear’s 159. That would likely take part of three seasons and Nick is 70 years old -- the age when Spurrier stepped down at South Carolina.
In the end, Spurrier says he’s not sorry he retired at South Carolina when he did. “I guess in the end I’ll be the winningest coach that wasn’t coaching at Alabama,” he said with self-amusement. “So that’s my record now, and I guess it ain’t too bad.”
The mere fact that the Birmingham Monday Morning Quarterback Club chose Spurrier for this honor at age 77, inviting him and former players Shane Matthews and Chris Doering, is indicative of how much respect he still proffers.
Nick Saban didn’t hold back on his praise for Spurrier Monday night, either.
“What Coach Spurrier did on and off the field was pretty much second to none," said Saban.
“Steve was always sort of an icon in terms of great scheme offensively, really great play-caller, really hard to defend because he was really kind of unpredictable, but not unpredictable in a bad way but always very well-prepared. His offensive teams were very well-coached, really hard to defend what he did.”
One stat alone would mandate that respect. In four outings, while Spurrier was coaching at Florida and South Carolina, his team beat Saban’s teams at LSU or Alabama three times. So beating the G.O.A.T. three out of four would make you the G.O.A.T. , right? Spurrier said no.
“I never looked at it like that,” said Spurrier. “It wasn’t me coaching against the other coach. I was coaching against the other team – offense, defense, special teams.”
Still, you cannot argue against the HBC’s success. Not even Saban will.
“To be honest with you, we never had a whole lot of success against him if you really wanna look at the record,” the Alabama coach acknowledged. “He was someone that I always looked up to in terms of the success that he had, the program that he ran, the things that he did, the relationships that he made with players. So I have the utmost respect for him and still do.”
The club also honored the late Eddie Robinson, hall of fame coach of Grambling. “I think he coached there for 57 years!” Spurrier exclaimed in respect for the late Grambling coach.
Speaking of respect, Spurrier heaped it on Alabama, naming its football program as the G.O.A.T.
His praise for the Crimson Tide football program as the standard for CFB was downright effusive, labeling it “the best ever – just always more or less has been for 100 years.” He ticked off the names of the ’Bama coaches who advanced the dynasty. “Bryant, Saban, (Gene) Stallings, Wallace Wade …”
It’s not just the number of national championships they’ve won in Tuscaloosa, Spurrier said. “But because they do it the right way. Their guys don’t play dirty. They don’t hit you out of bounds. They don’t brag about knocking quarterbacks out of games – stuff like that. They PLAY the game. And if anybody hot-dogs around in an Alabama uniform, the coaches will jerk their butts out and put them on the bench! I mean they play clear, hard, fair – and I just admire the way they do it.”
Since the Saban award was about legacy, I asked the HBC what it felt like when he first set foot on Gator soil in 1963.
“I made my official visit in March,” he recalled. “I did not know where I wanted to go to school. If we’d had a National Signing Day in February like they do now, I might woulda signed with Ole Miss. In the sixties they were the best passing team in the SEC.
“So I said, ‘heck, I’ll just wait until basketball season is over.’ And Coach (Ray) Graves started recruiting me. When I took my visit to Gainesville it was about 75 (degrees) there and 35 degrees in Johnson City. Coach Graves was a big factor. He said he’d give me a chance to play as a sophomore. And away we went.”
Indeed, away they did go to unprecedented heights. God really did smile on the Gators.
I have often wondered if the temperature were reversed and it had been a gloomy day in Gainesville, how history might have been altered. Who knows? Billy Napier’s team may have been playing on Tim Tebow Field instead.
I was at UF when Steve was QB. I was in the stands when he kicked the field goal to beat Auburn and win the Heisman.
That's some good sports writing!