Nick Saban makes his stance clear on how Will Howard & Co.'s loss against Michigan impacted their season
Nick Saban is no stranger to success. The college football coaching icon knows what comes with it, as well. He saw how the effects of winning lulled his teams into being over-confident, and then how it had an adverse effect on what was to come.
Saban explained the dynamic, tying it in with Ohio State's regular season-ending defeat to the Michigan Wolverines this season.
"When you win, sometimes, people have a much harder time dealing with success than they do failure," Nick Saban said Tuesday on 'The Pivot Podcast.' "Most of the time, when people fail, they wanna change. They wanna do whatever they have to do to make it right. But, when you win, and you have success, you feel like, 'I should be able to celebrate this.'"
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Nick Saban remembers it well, his Alabama Crimson Tide squads riding sizable winning streaks and seeing them come to abrupt halts because of the poison of success.
"We won 19 games in a row twice at Alabama," Saban said. "And both times, we lost to a team that wasn't as good as us – and it was because we could not deal with success. It starts to affect your preparation, your habits in practice, and then those things start showing up in a game. And then you get exposed, and then you get beat.
"I sometimes say, 'You need to lose.' I think the best thing that ever happened to Ohio State is getting beat by Michigan. Because they got criticized so much for that, and everybody was humiliated," he added.
Why Nick Saban thinks Ohio State's loss to Michigan was a blessing in disguise
The scene at Ohio Stadium on Nov. 30 was noticeable even on TV screens across the country. Following a postgame scuffle due to the Wolverines trying to plant their flag at midfield to punctuate the 13-10 upset victory, Buckeyes coach Ryan Day appeared confused, still processing what had just happened.
However, what came after that loss was the stuff of legend. Ohio State won four straight games against daunting opponents to wind up lifting the College Football Playoff national title trophy at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta after beating the Notre Dame Fighting Irish 34-23 on Monday night.
Nick Saban wondered, even before that win, if the Buckeyes would've been in the spot if not for the adversity they faced.
"If they won that game [against Michigan], would they have that same sort of edge to them that they've had in playing angry for these last three games that they've played?" Saban said. "I mean, they've been pretty dominant. I just think a lot about the psychological part of it."
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Ryan Day gets to rest well for the time being, knowing his team climbed to the mountaintop despite the heartbreak. Maybe he can thank Michigan for the motivation it provided.