Nick Saban, Dabo Swinney swat away suggestion Alabama-Clemson is bad for college football
SAN JOSE, Calif. — After all the pictures were taken and questions answered, Dabo Swinney shook Nick Saban’s hand and wrapped his arm around the veteran Alabama head coach’s shoulder, smiling as the two friends and contemporaries walked off the same College Football Playoff stage together once again.
For the third time in four years, Saban will lead the top-ranked Crimson Tide (14-0) against Swinney and No. 2 Clemson (14-0) in Monday’s College Football Playoff national championship game (8 p.m. ET) from Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California. It’s also the fourth consecutive season the powerhouse programs will meet in the Playoff, with Alabama winning two of the previous three match-ups.
Of course, whether that’s good for the sport of college football is neither of their concerns.
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“I can't really speak for other teams or what the impact of college football really is,” Saban said during the coaches press conference Sunday morning, “but it's my job and my responsibility to do the best job that we can for our team, our players, our program in terms of what it takes for us to be successful, and I guess that's what we'll continue to focus on.”
As national conjecture rages about whether to expand the Playoff from four to eight or more teams, with the idea of the annual postseason event becoming more inclusionary, both of the last two head coaches to win national titles appeared completely against the idea.
In fact, Swinney was particularly defiant in his answer.
“I'm not going to apologize for having a great team and a great program and a bunch of committed guys, and Coach Saban is not, either,” Swinney said. “I think the objective is to get the two best teams (playing for the championship). That's kind of the way it is. If that's not best for college football, then why did we even do it?”
Swinney, a member of Alabama’s 1992 national championship team, defended the current playoff model, which began in 2014 after a 15-year run by the Bowl Championship Series, in which the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked teams at the end of the regular season played for the national title.
“I think it works. We went to a playoff, and the two best teams are here, and the two best teams have been here every year. Last year the two best teams were there,” Swinney said, referring to Alabama’s 26-23 overtime victory over Georgia in last season’s national title.
“If this isn't good for college football, (having) the two best teams (in the championship game), then we just kind of go back to the way it used to be and create all the good match-ups however you want them and then you just kind of elect a captain and you've got one national champion in this poll and one national champion in this poll and one national champion in this poll.”