Michigan football's shadow once was annoying enough to drive Nick Saban away

Rainer Sabin | Detroit Free Press

Show Caption Hide Caption Michigan's Don Brown on the challenge of Alabama's star receivers Michigan defensive coordinator Don Brown on the challenge of facing Alabama's star receivers, Dec. 29, 2019.

ORLANDO – It was almost 25 years ago, on a basketball court at the Breslin Center where Nick Saban moonlighted as a hype man. At a February 1995 hoops showdown with the Spartans’ greatest rival, the newly hired Michigan State football coach made a plea to the fans at halftime.

“Before I leave, there's one thing I have to ask of you,” he yelled into a microphone. “In the second half, I want you to be the best fans in America so we can beat Michigan’s ass!"

The crowd cheered loudly.

“Obviously, all the students loved it,” Jason Strayhorn recalled.

Strayhorn and his Michigan State teammates seemed to dig it, too. Their new coach not only grasped, but prioritized, defeating the giant that stood 65 miles southeast in Ann Arbor.

Saban had been conditioned to take this approach — to feel this way — after serving on Earle Bruce’s staff at Ohio State and working under George Perles with the Spartans.

So, for the next five seasons, Michigan was never far from Saban’s mind, occupying space rent-free in his head as he tried to figure out a way to get the upper hand in a series that long favored the Wolverines.

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“Every game, there was a high level of focus,” said Strayhorn, the former All-Big Ten center. “But there was more for the Michigan rivalry because he understood what it meant not only for the student body and the legacy, but recruiting, too.”

As the ultimate pragmatist, Saban was keenly aware that players, more than clever schemes and systems, made a team go. His ability to find and develop talent is what made him the best coach of his generation. It’s how he turned LSU into a power and restored Alabama to glory.

In Tuscaloosa, he has attracted the best players from all over the country and forged a dynasty that has five national titles. Many of those players will be on the field Wednesday in the Citrus Bowl against Michigan — the very program Saban was obsessed with beating once upon a time.

“If you look at Alabama historically, it has not fared well in these games when there wasn’t much to play for beyond (a title),” said Brian Mosallam, a former guard at Michigan State under Saban. “But I think that will not be the case (Wednesday) because of (Saban’s) personal feelings about Michigan and being the head coach at Michigan State. I think it will always be in the back of his head.”

When Saban arrived in East Lansing, Michigan had won five of the previous seven meetings with the Spartans and smothered the program in almost every aspect. The effect had been profound; Saban’s first class included only one recruit from Michigan — Detroit’s Davarrio Carter.

“And he knows more than anyone else that recruiting is the lifeblood of the program,” former Michigan State quarterback Bill Burke said.

To upgrade the talent, Saban realized he’d have to change the perception of the top high school players in the Spartans’ backyard. The quickest way to accomplish that was to beat Michigan on the field.

“That week was more intense,” Mosallam said. “He was more intense. His attention to detail seemed to be greater. He was dialed in.”

Saban did whatever he could to gain an edge. He resorted to motivational ploys, bringing in Buck Nystrom, the former All-American and 1955 national championship team member, to rally his bunch one year.

He also deviated from the norm, installing trick plays that would be folded into the game plans for the Wolverines.

“We always worked on it during practice,” Burke said. “We always had a wrinkle in there. I never thought we’d run the play in the game. But usually every time we ended up doing it.”

There was the fake field goal in 1997, when Burke, as the holder, connected with Sedrick Irvin for a 22-yard touchdown pass that accounted for Michigan State’s only score that day. Two years later, the quarterback executed a tone-setting flea flicker, launching a pass to Plaxico Burress that covered 68 yards in a 34-31 victory over the Wolverines.

It was Saban’s last win over Michigan as the Spartans’ coach. Seven weeks later, he arrived at LSU. And it was not by coincidence that he picked that particular program as his next move. The Tigers are the only Power Five institution in a state that has long been a fertile recruiting ground. In Baton Rouge, Saban wouldn't have any direct competitors within the boundaries of Louisiana.

It also was far from Michigan's shadow, something two victories in his five seasons as the Spartans' coach could not remove, as Saban later lamented.

“At Michigan State, we were never No. 1," he told reporters. "That was always Michigan. It was always Michigan this or that.”

Mosallam remembered he was surprised by those comments, thinking Saban had inured himself to that reality.

But Strayhorn wasn’t.

“I think that gave him a little sense of frustration while he was in East Lansing,” he said. “Michigan was always there. It was always there. You heard it in the locker room from players and coaches alike. And Nick Saban wasn’t immune from that.”

Rather, he was confronted with it every day until he walked out the door of the Duffy Daugherty building for the final time and headed due south — away from East Lansing and the Michigan monster that loomed in the near distance.

Contact Rainer Sabin: rsabin@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @RainerSabin. Read more on the Michigan Wolverines, Michigan State Spartans and sign up for our Big Ten newsletter.