As Saban can attest, timing is everything
In later years, Nick Saban will look back on it as the most important move of his coaching career, a behind-the-scenes story that moved at warp speed.
Gerry DiNardo had been fired as LSU coach with a game remaining in the 1999 season. Whereupon, Gil Brandt, former personnel boss of the Dallas Cowboys, called his friend, the coach at Michigan State, with an urgent suggestion.
“You better look into that opening at LSU,” Brandt told Saban.
Saban dialed his agent, Jimmy Sexton, who lives in Memphis, Tenn. Sexton dialed Sean Tuohy, his longtime friend, business associate and native New Orleanian. Tuohy called Joe Dean, LSU’s athletic director.
It wasn’t long before Dean was getting a call from Sexton, informing him of Saban’s interest in the job. It wasn’t long before an LSU delegation was at Sexton’s home in Memphis, talking to Saban, who had flown from East Lansing, Mich.
The delegation included Dean, Chancellor Mark Emmert and two members of the LSU Board of Supervisors.
nola.com
11/5/08
Magnolia Tribune
