Alabama head football coach Nick Saban made his weekly appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” on Thursday to discuss his Crimson Tide's 27-24 win over Georgia in the SEC Championship Game as well as the upcoming challenges in the College Football Playoffs.
In most years, deciding the four teams that make the playoffs has been a fairly easy decision. This year, the decision was one of the most difficult and controversial in history. As a result, Alabama was the last team in, leaving out an undefeated ACC Champion Florida State.
After the bracket was released, Saban’s phone number was leaked, resulting in hundreds of anonymous phone calls from angry fans.
“Everybody needs to understand — and my phone’s been getting blown up from people who didn’t get in as if I’m responsible for that — look, we’ve been on the other side of this,” Saban told host Pat McAfee. “We’ve been on the outside looking in.”
Saban showed empathy for the teams excluded from the playoffs, acknowledging that his own teams have faced similar situations in the past.
“We’ve been the team that didn’t get in,” Saban said. “We’ve been the fifth-place team. So we kind of know how it feels, and I actually feel bad about it because there really are a lot of teams this year who could make an argument to say, ‘We should be there.’ And I get that.”
However, Saban remains unapologetic for all the promotion he provided for his team’s case to be in the College Football Playoffs.
“My responsibility and obligation is to our team, so I did the best job that I could to promote what we’ve been able to accomplish in winning 11 straight games or whatever, beating the No. 1 team in the country in Georgia,” Saban said. “We’re a different team now than we were earlier in the season. That was my obligation to our players and our team, and I’m proud of them for the way they responded to it. I'm proud of them for the way they played in the SEC Championship Game.”
No. 4 Alabama will face No. 1 Michigan on January 1 in the Rose Bowl at 4 p.m. CT on ESPN.
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