Multiple times each season, it seems Alabama football head coach Nick Saban faces one of his former assistants. From Kirby Smart to Steve Sarkisian to Lane Kiffin and more, the Saban coaching tree has limbs across the sport.

On Saturday, the tables will be turned for Alabama. Crimson Tide offensive coordinator Tommy Rees will face off against his old boss, LSU head coach Brian Kelly.

During his Thursday appearance on the Pat McAfee Show, Saban was asked whether the familiarity made a difference, or was just “media fodder”

“I think probably a little more media fodder,” Saban said. ” because when you actually do the scouting reports and look at the film and do all the cut-ups – we’ve got probably 100 different cut-ups that we watch about things – they kind of get it what we’re doing, we kind of get it, what they’re doing, so if you had any inside information, it probably wouldn’t be much to add on to what you would learn through the course of your preparation.”

Rees played for Kelly as a quarterback at Notre Dame. He took over at his alma mater as a quarterbacks coach in 2017, before a promotion to offensive coordinator in 2020.

He joined Alabama in the same position this offseason. On Wednesday, Saban was asked about Rees’ preparation going against his old boss.

“I don’t think anything different,” Saban said. “Tommy works hard and tries to do the best he can to help our players to play well in the game. I don’t think in these kinds of games you want to sort of try to – I don’t know what you would call it – do a lot of new stuff because the players need to have confidence in what you’re doing, and they gain confidence in doing that through cumulative reps throughout the course of the season.

“And if you just make a bunch of changes, they start looking at you like, ‘Don’t you think we can execute what we’ve been doing?’ So I think you’ve got to be a little careful, but I don’t see that happening. I think he’s focused on trying to get our players in the right spots to do the right things that help them have a chance to be successful.”

Alabama and LSU are scheduled to kick off at 6:45 p.m. CT Saturday at Bryant-Denny Stadium. The game will be aired on CBS.