Nick Saban expects a 'big improvement' from Alabama in 2025

Nick Saban is optimistic about the direction of the Alabama football program heading into Year 2 of the Kalen DeBoer era. The legendary Crimson Tide coach believes that with a year of learning DeBoer’s system, the team is in line to see a “big improvement.”

Alabama went 9-4 in DeBoer’s inaugural season following the retirement of Saban, who won six national championships in 17 seasons in Tuscaloosa. But programs often take an even bigger jump in the second year under a coach, and Saban thinks the Crimson Tide are poised to do exactly that.

“I think Kalen’s doing a great job,” he said at the Nick Saban Legacy Awards on Monday evening. “There was so much in the transition last year. It was very, very difficult. A lot of players left when we retired, which I hated to see. The coaching changes, the staff changes — players really relate to people in the organization, so when you change a lot of those people, it’s a big change for the players.

“I think the team this year is much more grounded in terms of what coach DeBoer really wants. And he’s been great with me. He comes and sees me. We talk all the time. He’s always inviting me to come to practice. I try to keep my distance because I don’t want to meddle in what he’s trying to do, but I think they have the right staff, I think they have the right people and I think you’ll see a big improvement in Alabama’s team this year.”

We’ve seen big improvement from DeBoer in his previous two stops as well. The coach first took over an FBS job in 2020 at Fresno State, going 3-3 before improving to 9-3 by his second season. That landed him the job at Washington.

DeBoer took the Huskies to an 11-2 finish and won the Alamo Bowl in his first year. He followed that up with a 2023 season in which he led the team to the national title game, where it ultimately lost to Michigan.

That put him on everyone’s radar and made him Alabama’s top candidate to take over when Saban retired. By all means, it was a solid first year and the team might have even been in the conversation to make the College Football Playoff had it not suffered an upset against Oklahoma late in the season.

But Nick Saban’s first season at Alabama wasn’t perfect either. He went just 7-6 before following that up with a 12-2 record in his second season. By his third year, he claimed his first national championship with the Crimson Tide.

Perhaps DeBoer can follow a similar trajectory. Even if he improves by just one game Alabama would likely be in a position to make playoff, and Saban certainly seems to think the team has what it takes to get there.