Nick Saban might have walked away from coaching. But his fingerprints are all over this year’s NFL conference championship games. Alabama’s footprint stretches across three of the four teams still standing: the Denver Broncos, New England Patriots, and Seattle Seahawks. Ohio State isn’t far behind in this race, though, with the Buckeyes producing their own impressive crop of championship-caliber talent. 

Eight former Alabama players will take the field in conference championship weekend, while Ohio State has seven representatives. The Broncos, riding high as the AFC’s top seed after their overtime thriller against Buffalo, will feature Alabama’s Pat Surtain II and defensive lineman Que Robinson alongside Ohio State’s Jonathon Cooper. These two were teammates in Tuscaloosa during Alabama’s undefeated 2020 national championship run. Now they’re anchoring a Denver defense that’s one win away from the Super Bowl. 

The Patriots, meanwhile, bring Christian Barmore and Anfernee Jennings from Alabama, plus Ohio State’s TreVeyon Henderson and offensive lineman Thayer Munford to Empower Field. Barmore and Jennings overlapped in Tuscaloosa from 2018 to 2019, when Jennings was a veteran leader, and Barmore was still finding his way as an underclassman.​

The NFC Championship might as well be a college football reunion. Seattle’s roster features four Alabama alumni: quarterback Jalen Milroe, veteran defensive tackle Jarran Reed, tight end Robbie Ouzts, and defensive back Josh Jobe. They’ll be going up against a Rams team with three Ohio State products in Ty Hamilton, long snapper Jake McQuaide, and tight end Nick Vannett. Jobe, Milroe, and Ouzts all shared the field in 2021 when Jobe was a senior, and the other two were true freshmen. Then Milroe and Ouzts became long-time running mates from 2021 through 2024. 

The Seahawks’ Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Ohio State’s dynamic receiver, has been Sam Darnold’s go-to weapon all season. He caught a touchdown in their divisional-round demolition of the 49ers. JSN’s college career overlapped with nearly everyone on the Ohio State side. He played with Jonathon Cooper in 2020, alongside Thayer Munford and TreVeyon Henderson in 2021, and spent multiple seasons with Ty Hamilton from 2020 to 2022.

The most compelling thread running through this weekend’s matchups is the 2021 College Football Playoff National Championship. Alabama crushed Ohio State 52-24. Christian Barmore dominated that game, earning Defensive MVP honors while consistently wreaking havoc against Ohio State’s offensive line. That O-line included Thayer Munford, who was protecting the edge all night.

 Pat Surtain II and Josh Jobe were locking down the Buckeyes’ passing attack, while Jonathon Cooper and a young Jaxon Smith-Njigba tried to keep Ohio State competitive from the sideline. Four years later, those same players are about to face off again, just in different uniforms and with different stakes. 

There’s also the 2015 Sugar Bowl connection, where Ohio State upset Alabama 42-35 in the CFP semifinal. That game featured Alabama’s Jarran Reed going against Ohio State tight end Nick Vannett, who caught two passes in that historic Buckeyes win.​

The lexicon lives on

Nick Saban’s influence doesn’t stop at the players he sent to the NFL. His entire vocabulary has become part of college football’s DNA. Case in point: Indiana’s Curt Cignetti, who served as Alabama’s receivers coach from 2007-2010, pulled out the old “rat poison” line heading into Monday’s national championship game against Miami. 

Saban famously used “rat poison” to describe any positive press that could make his teams complacent. And it has become shorthand across the sport for avoiding distractions. Cignetti told reporters that Indiana needed to ignore the “pro-Indiana hype” and sentimentalism. He declared, “You don’t go to war with warm milk and cookies.” It’s been years since Cignetti left Tuscaloosa. But when the pressure’s highest, he’s reaching back to the coaching principles that shaped him under Saban.​

The fact that coaches still invoke Nick Saban’s phrases speaks to how deeply he’s embedded himself in football culture. From “rat poison” to “the process,” Saban created a language that transcended Alabama’s program. Saban’s coaching tree has spread his philosophy far and wide. The words might sound different coming from different voices. But the blueprint remains unmistakably his.​

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