1 chart shows the dominance of Nick Saban’s Alabama football teams

Alabama head football coach Nick Saban is retiring, two people with knowledge of the situation told the Tuscaloosa News, part of the USA TODAY Network, on Wednesday. They requested anonymity because they were not authorized to share the news publicly.

One chart shows how dominant Saban and his Alabama teams have been in the past 17 years. Between November 2008 and October 2023, Alabama was the nation’s top-ranked team as often as they weren’t in the US LBM Coaches Poll coaches poll.

That time includes six national championships: 2009 2011, 2012, 2015, 2017 and 2020. Also in that time, college coaches ranked Alabama the nation’s top team 113 times.

How Nick Saban’s teams have dominated college football

Saban ends his 50-year coaching career as one of college football’s most successful coaches. The former Kent State defensive back got his first head coaching job in 1990 at Toledo. The Rockets would go 9-2 in his lone season at Toledo before he moved to be the Cleveland Browns defensive coordinator.

Saban jumped back into college when he took over the head coaching job at Michigan State in 1995. In East Lansing, Saban brought the Spartans back to relevance after several losing seasons prior, and taking Michigan State to three bowl games in five seasons. After the end of the 1999 regular season, Saban bolted to LSU, where he became a national championship-winning coach in 2003 after the Tigers won the BCS National Championship Game against Oklahoma.

Nick Saban’s coaching career by the numbers

During Saban’s 28-year career at Division-I schools, his teams won more than 80% of their games. At Alabama, his winning percentage rose to nearly nine in every 10 games.