August 13, 1997; East Lansing, MI; MSU football coach Nick Saban waits to have his team's picture taken during Media Day at Spartan Stadium Wednesday. Mandatory Credit: David Olds/Lansing State Journal-USA TODAY NETWORK Lansing State Journal-USA TODAY NETWORK

Nick Saban Reveals Huge Lesson Learned at MSU

Originally posted on Michigan State Spartans on SI
By Michael France | Last updated Jan 23, 2025 10:56 AM ET

There are high-energy coaches and those who are less emotive.

No one would accuse former Michigan State coach and seven-time national champion Nick Saban of being the latter.

The headsets broke a lot less in the later years of Saban, but in the beginning his expressive nature was mistaken for the raging, disciplinarian head coach. A lot of that portrayal came from the media, whom Saban had yet to build a solid relationship with; that being, he needed to learn how to use the media to his advantage.

During his recent appearance on "The Pivot Podcast," Saban revealed a valuable lesson Saban learned from his wife Terry on how to manage his image and grow relationships with the media.

“When I was at Michigan State, I mean the media made me Attila the Hun,” Saban said. “Like I was this mean, angry coach who was getting on everybody all the time. They were 2-9 when you visited there coming off that last season, then I took over. So it was a tough job. It was a tough rebuild. And I was, I was nervous, I was anxious, I always thought I was going to say the wrong thing, I didn’t develop any relationships with people in the media. So they made me out to be this sort of Attila the Hun bad guy.

“And I would go home and I’d say, ‘I’m not really like that, man. I hate that these, it just bothers me that everybody’s making me out to be this way.’ And she said, ‘Do you ever look at yourself?’ Said, ‘Just look at yourself. You’re nervous, you’re anxious, you’re curt with the people, you don’t respect them, you say they’re asking dumb questions. I mean what do you expect?'”

As Saban tells it, he initially didn't handle the criticism from his wife well. But then he used it to grow as a coach and person. The rest is history.

“It really pissed me off. I mean I really got pissed,” Saban said. “But then when I thought about it I said, you know, she’s right. And I started to change and I started developing relationships, taking time with people, having them in my office, talking to them. It was very, very helpful.

“And that’s one of the reasons I always had a really good relationship with ESPN. Because I was one of the first to let them come to practice and do whatever they call those things where they do the two-a-days and all that kind of stuff. But I think that really helped your image, which helps recruiting, which helps all kinds of things.”

This article first appeared on Michigan State Spartans on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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