Nick Saban reflects on the life of Bobby Bowden

you know a couple things i'd like to mention is um you know coach bobby bowden's passing is something that really is um saddens all of college football uh this guy was probably the greatest ambassador at least in my view or one of the great ambassadors of all time because he coached he had success coaching but he was also one of the greatest people and set up an outstanding example for everyone in our profession in terms of uh you don't have to dislike somebody you don't have to discredit somebody that you're competing against that um your your example of being a good person is you know something that can help us all professionally uh he wasn't always just about him uh he was always about helping other people and our thoughts and prayers go out to his family um and friends uh the this is a very sad time for all of us but you know coach bowden leaves a legacy that a lot of us can continue to learn from and grow from and uh something that will never be forgotten so um really sorry for him and his family and our thoughts and prayers are with them i think everybody knows this story but i think it's still worth you know telling because there's not very many people in the world that would have that kind of compassion for somebody else when coach bowden was a an assistant coach at west virginia university and i think jim carlin was the head coach i kind of recruited the area that i grew up in west virginia which was pretty rural and you know i think we had three players from my era that played at west virginia university that were really good players and all ended up making all-american uh that coach bowden recruited that my dad actually coached in pop warner um so they knew each other much better than i knew coach bowden as a high school player growing up but um my first year being a graduate assistant when my father passed away and i was at kent state being a graduate assistant for don james and um [Music] you know one day the phone rings and it's coach bowden and you know he says i know your father passed away i know your mom might be struggling if you feel like you need to come closer to home because morgantown was like 25 miles from where i grew up i'll ha i have a job for you here if you need to do that so i was like wow this guy's the head coach of west virginia university and he's has that much compassion for my family and our situation and our circumstance and my mother um i not very many people would would do something like that so but i think that was a reflection of what kind of person he was i've always tried to emulate coach bowden in terms of the class that he represented his organization with i seldom said a bad word about anybody i was always very kind and upbeat to everybody that he ever met and was always that way with me and i would talk to him on occasion about um you know things that you know i had questioned about professionally and there's probably not many in this profession that i have more respect for than coach bowell not only as a coach not only what he sort of accomplished on the field but the kind of person he was the kind of character he had and the class that he sort of exemplified as a college football coach

Channel: Alabama Crimson Tide on AL.com

Views: 74,367

Keywords: Alabama, Crimson Tide, Roll Tide

Id: V9ThqnKcu9g

Length: 3min 38sec (218 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 08 2021