Paul Finebaum compares Kalen DeBoer to Nick Saban in one vital way

Kalen DeBoer had an interesting in his first season as head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide.

For many coaches, a 9-4 season while being in the conversation for the College Football Playoff right up until the end would be a massive success in Year 1. That’s never going to be the case at Alabama, though, especially with the memory of Nick Saban’s six national championships still fresher than fallen snow.

The expectations will always be unfairly high for DeBoer, but he’s followed up his 9-4 season with several massive offseason wins. 

DeBoer has cleaned up on the recruiting trail, and that’s an area of program building that Saban was always highly successful at.

Alabama’s second-season coach has been so good on the recruiting trail, in fact, that SEC expert Paul Finebaum drew a direct connection between him and Saban.

“Quite frankly, this is one of the great recruiting runs we’ve seen in some years,” Finebaum recently said on “McElroy & Cubelic In The Morning” (h/t On3). “It almost feels like Nick Saban is running the ship again when it comes to recruiting because this is vintage Alabama recruiting.”

To Finebaum’s point, Alabama’s 2026 class is currently ranked No. 8 in the country. DeBoer has already landed two five-star recruits, EDGE Xavier Griffin and cornerback Jorden Edmonds, and the Crimson Tide have had an incredible month of June.

Of the 15 hard commitments to Alabama for 2026, nine committed this month. 

Finebaum is giving DeBoer credit, but he ultimately believes much of what the Crimson Tide are doing on the recruiting trail right now can be attributed to the brand that Saban built during his 17 seasons in Tuscaloosa.

“Nick Saban may be gone but Alabama is still one of the great standards of all time in college football and I think a lot of people forgot that, especially younger people who only knew the Nick Saban era,” said Finebaum.