MONTGOMERY, Ala. — “No man stands as tall as when he stoops to help a child,” recently retired University of Alabama football coach Nick Saban told more than 2,500 gathered for Faulkner University’s annual benefit dinner.

“And being an adoptive parent myself, I’m so proud of what you’ve been able to accomplish and what you’re able to do,” he added, directly addressing the adoptive and foster parents in the audience.

“There’s no greater impact that you can make on a young person than being a parent, caring and making the sacrifices you have to make to be a good parent, set an example (and) give them an opportunity to be successful.”

Saban — who adopted two children, Nicholas and Kristen, with his wife, Terry, and “adopted” hundreds more as a coach — drew a sellout crowd to the event, which celebrated heroes of adoption and foster care.

“It’s time to turn the hearts of adults to the children,” Faulkner President Mitch Henry said in his speech. “It’s time to change our culture by strengthening families. Those heroes that we celebrate tonight, they challenge us … to be the change.”

Henry announced a new “Christ-centered social work program to train the next generation of adoption and foster care agency workers” who will “assist the most vulnerable children … with the ethic of Christ.”

He also touted the 34,000 free clinical visits Faulkner has provided to children and adults with disabilities at no cost — including physical, speech, occupational and behavioral therapy, as well as mental health counseling for their entire families.

Before Saban’s Q&A with U.S. Sen. Katie Britt, Faulkner recognized more than 130 adoptive and foster parents onstage, parading them through the Marriott ballroom in a “Walk of Honor.”

Nick and Miss Terry, as she is affectionately known, have a long history of helping their community — they started the Nick’s Kids Foundation when Nick coached at Michigan State in the late 1990s and have continued the foundation’s work in Tuscaloosa.

There, it has been involved in building more than 20 homes, schooling children in juvenile detention and distributing nearly $6 million to more than 150 charities for students, teachers and other children’s causes.

It’s currently building the Saban Center, a facility with STEM and arts programs for West Alabama children that Saban said will be “a monument to the state of Alabama.”

He credited Terry as the driving force behind much of the good the couple has been able to do.

“She’s always made me better. … She has the biggest heart of anybody.” Saban said.

“She’s been the person that has the compassion to make it happen for us,” he later added.

The Sabans have also given more than $1.5 million to first generation scholarships at the University of Alabama.

And despite being called the GOAT, the greatest of all time, with seven college football national titles — the most of any coach and one more than another famed Alabama coach, Paul “Bear” Bryant — Saban said he is most proud of the nearly 700 college graduates his football program produced in 17 years.

“Seeing guys develop for life after football was probably more important than just winning a game,” he said, adding that the relationships with players were his favorite part about coaching.

Saban spoke much about coaching his players to have discipline, make good decisions, develop character and be accountable — and how those ideas apply to parenting.

“How many times do your kids say ‘I don’t feel like studying, I don’t feel like cleaning my room’?” he asked. But to promote good choices, coaches and parents have to ask young people, “How is this behavior going to help you accomplish these goals you set out?”

Saban also talked about the values he learned from his parents — especially his father, Nick Saban Sr.

His father often told him that “compassion is the greatest indicator of your character” and that “the most important judgment you pass is not the one you pass on others but the one you pass on yourself.”

His father also instilled a philosophy that Saban passed on to his players — to only be satisfied when they reached their full potential on and off the field.

“It’s more important to give your best effort — to be the best you can be, to do the best you can do — than to win,” he said.

Though Saban didn’t speak directly about his faith — he’s a member of the Catholic Church and attends Mass at St. Francis of Assisi in Tuscaloosa — his language often drew from Christian themes.

He mentioned the Golden Rule, “reaping what you sow,” “God-given” talent, blessings and prayer.

“I always ask, ‘How do you pray? Do you pray to be blessed, or do you pray to be a blessing?’” Saban said.

Many Crimson Tide fans — and Tuscaloosa residents — have certainly felt blessed since he landed in Tuscaloosa in 2007.

Even here in Montgomery, what would’ve been enemy territory for Saban a year ago — less than an hour from the campus of Auburn University, Alabama’s in-state rival — he drew thunderous applause.

Rhonda Zorn Fernandez, a board member for both Faulkner and The Christian Chronicle, said she was “more excited than an Auburn grad should be” to hear Saban. And President Henry, a member of a long line of Auburn alumni, praised Saban’s accomplishments through adoption and charity.

Fernandez and Henry’s eagerness to have Saban was indicative of the impact he’s made on the state.

“The relationship we have with the community — it doesn’t matter how much money you have, is something you can’t buy,” Saban said.

This piece is republished with permission from The Christian Chronicle.

Calvin Cockrell is a freelance digital media specialist, media editor for The Christian Chronicle and copyeditor for Religion Unplugged. He also serves as the young adults minister for the North Tuscaloosa Church of Christ in Alabama.