Skip to content

Alabama's Nick Saban: Differing rules within Power 5 have SEC at 'disadvantage'

Matthew Emmons-USA TODAY Sports / Reuters

SEC coaches were at their annual spring meetings Tuesday, with a number of topics on the table regarding the perceived disadvantages the conference has to deal with in relation to other Power 5 schools.

Among the topics are a proposed rule banning satellite summer camps and whether to accept graduate student transfers.

Alabama head football coach Nick Saban wants all conferences to follow the same rules.

"These things need to be global, otherwise we're going to become a farm system for all the other leagues," Saban said, according to Jon Solomon of CBS Sports. "And then the first question we're going to get asked is, we win seven national championships in a row and (reporters ask), 'Well, what's the state of the SEC? You haven't been in the championship game the last two years.'"

Saban was adamant in his assertion that the SEC, ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, and Pac-12 should observe the same rules.

"If we're going to compete for the championship and everybody is going to play in the playoff system and everybody is going to compete for that," Saban said. "We need to get our rules in alignment so we're all on a level playing field, whether they're transfer rules, whether they're satellite camp rules.

"It's a disadvantage not to be able to do something in one league and be able to do it in another. It's a disadvantage to be able to recruit a player in one league and not be able to do it in another."

Former Notre Dame quarterback Everett Golson recently transferred to Florida State and is immediately eligible to play in Tallahassee as a graduate transfer.

Alabama, Florida, and Georgia were all rumored to be on Golson's short list, but the SEC would have required him to obtain a waiver approved by the conference commissioner. Based on the SEC criteria for the waiver, Golson would not have met the portion which states the graduate transfer was not subject to disciplinary action at his previous institution.

Regarding the matter of satellite camps, which other leagues have set up in the Southeast this summer, the NCAA continues to permit coaches to be guests at out-of-state camps.

As other conferences have not expressed any desire to change the NCAA's rule, the SEC would need to change its own rule and permit the practice to level the playing field.

South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier summed up the SEC's view of satellite camps nicely.

"Our league prefers they would be outlawed (nationally)," he said, according to Brett McMurphy of ESPN.

Daily Newsletter

Get the latest trending sports news daily in your inbox