A Disney Princess Concert, ESPN’s "SABAN," and an Unexpected Lesson About Life

On Thursday, the six-part ESPN series SABAN dropped, offering an in-depth look at the career of Nick Saban, best known for his extraordinary 17-year run at the University of Alabama, where he led the Crimson Tide to six national championships.

As someone whose Disney interests extend beyond the parks and films, I’m drawn to the many ways the company’s storytelling reaches into the world of sports. But I didn’t expect a series about one of college football’s most accomplished coaches and a Disney concert I’d watched earlier that evening to offer such different perspectives on the same life lesson.

SABAN opens with “The Process,” an episode exploring the evolution of Nick Saban’s coaching philosophy, including his tenure at Michigan State and the team’s showdown with undefeated Ohio State. Michigan State entered the game as a significant underdog, with analysts giving the team a 0% chance of winning. Saban sought the advice of Dr. Lonny Rosen, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry, not to find a way to guarantee victory, but to figure out how to keep his players from being overwhelmed by the prospect of a potentially lopsided loss. Rosen suggested that the game would only become a terrible experience if the players allowed themselves to be consumed by the score. As their head coach, Saban should encourage them to focus on winning the play in front of them. A play lasts only about six or seven seconds. Give those seconds your full attention. 

The players noticed a difference in Saban’s demeanor during the practices that week. He wasn't uptight or stiff, and Saban tells the camera it was thanks to shifting the narrowing the focus to the immediate gameplay rather than allowing all the looming elements for a victory to overwhelm them. In the third quarter, when an interception returned for a touchdown left Michigan State trailing 23-9. Saban grabbed his quarterback's arm,  a simple gesture reminding him to leave the mistake behind rather than carry it into the next play.

And the Spartans would keep battling play after play and ultimately pulled off the upset. As Saban reflected on the philosophy behind that experience, he offered a lesson that extends beyond the game “so many of us think all the time about the past…what happened, how that affects our mood. But yet if you focus on right now. The future is where you are going to live the rest of your life.”

His words brought to mind a Disney concert I’d been watching earlier, Disney Believe in Concert , a 45-minute musical celebration of the new venues and entertainment coming to the ship’s December 2027 sailings. The program opened with Disney Legend Susan Egan singing “When You Wish Upon a Star” and featured selections including “Try Everything,” “Mother Knows Best,” “Immortals,” “How Far I’ll Go,” “If I Didn’t Have You,” and “Happily Ever After,” along with a medley from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. 

As I listened to Coach Saban, his words brought into focus a lesson I’d carried with me for years through Snow White’s story. After the death of her loving father, Snow White’s royal life was taken from her by a jealous stepmother, leaving her in rags and scrubbing the castle steps. She had gone from royalty to an underdog, facing an uphill battle through no fault of her own. Yet she continued to make the most of the circumstances immediately in front of her.

Snow White couldn’t undo the loss of her father or change her stepmother’s cruelty. But she could decide how to respond to the circumstances she faced. Lost in the forest, she befriended the animals who led her to a cottage. Seeing an opportunity for shelter, she improved the cottage’s condition in hopes its residents would let her stay. Each small step shaped her future, just as each play shaped Michigan State’s outcome.

In their own unexpected ways, SABAN: The Process and Disney Believe in Concert reminded me that the future is uncertain, but it is built one moment at a time. Circumstances may be daunting, but you need not solve everything all at once. Sometimes, the best thing you can do is focus on the moment immediately in front of you.