The National Football Foundation Former Alabama head coach Nick Saban was selected as part of the 2025 College Football Hall of Fame class. A seven-time national championship coach, Saban is the first of the 2025 class to be announced. He was informed during Friday evening’s ESPN College GameDay broadcast leading up to the College Football Playoff Semifinal contest in the Cotton Bowl between Texas and Ohio State.
UA said in a news release that Saban is the fifth Alabama coach to be elected to the College Football Hall of Fame and the 27th inductee in program history. He completed his Hall-of-Fame career at the conclusion of the 2023 season, winning six national championships with Alabama and seven overall with his first title coming at LSU in 2003.
A nine-time National Coach of the Year, Saban coached collegiate football for 28 seasons, producing a 297-71-1, including a 206-29 mark in Tuscaloosa. His teams at Alabama won nine SEC Championships while he captured 11 SEC titles in his career. The other two were during his time at LSU in 2001 and 2003.
Saban put his players into the NFL at a staggering rate, coaching fifty two first-round draft picks in his career. That’s the most by any coach in college football history – including close to fifty at Alabama. During his time in Tuscaloosa, over one hundred and thirty of Saban’s players were drafted into the National Football League with close to one hundred going in the first three rounds of the draft.
In 2021, Bryce Young became Saban’s fourth Heisman Trophy winner, tying for the most of any coach in college football history with Notre Dame’s Frank Leahy. He is the only coach to ever coach Heisman Trophy winners at three different positions, running back, wide receiver, and quarterback.
The Alabama program had just six individual national award winners when Saban arrived on campus, but Crimson Tide players secured sixty national awards during his time in Tuscaloosa. His players at Alabama won sixty six All-America honors by fifty eight different individuals.
The 2025 class will be officially inducted during the 67th NFF Annual Awards Dinner on December 9, 2025, at the Bellagio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. The inductees will also be recognized at their respective collegiate institutions with NFF Hall of Fame On-Campus Salutes during the fall.
