Coach Jim Feltz began Monongah High’s state football championships run in 1952 and 1955. 

His assistant was Earl Keener, who coached the Lions to 1968 and 1969 state titles with Nick Saban as the quarterback (in 1968) and Kerry Marbury as the ghost running back no one could grab (in 1968 and 1969). 

Mary Conaway Saban Pasko with
John Opyoke, his cousin Sandy

Tom Hulderman was Brother’s favorite receiver. 

Charlie Miller, Kerry’s teammate on a winning state championship track relay, also was a halfback.

Harry Davis, Joe Martin, John Fazio and Paul Deahl played major roles, too.

The 1968 and 1969 Monongah champions nucleus came from the Idamay Black Diamonds, a Pop Warner children’s football team that was coached by Nick Saban, Sr. and included Nick, Jr., Kerry and Tom, who went to East Monongah Junior High together before moving on to Monongah High.

Brother’s mother is Mary Conaway Saban Pasko, widow of Robert Pasko, her husband for 21 years after Nick, Sr. passed away. Mary is 84 and still going strong, a Saban tradition.

His sister is Dene Saban Thompson, a Monongah Elementary teacher who gave Nick the Brother nickname that sticks to this day among family and his Monongah High friends.

Both Kerry and Charlie Miller starred at WVU. 28 of the 31 players on the 1968 state championship team either live or died in Marion County. Tom was in the Chicago Cubs baseball farm system for nearly 5 years. 

Brother coached at Toledo, Michigan State and LSU, where he won one of his four national titles before winning three more at Alabama.