A perfect fall afternoon outside the posh Grand Bohemian in Mountain Brook was the setting.
Just the two most accomplished coaches in the state of Alabama sharing pleasantries — the toast of the SEC on this Third Tuesday of October in a world turned upside down.
It’s odd since their ball is perfectly round.
We’re talking about Alabama’s Nate Oats and Auburn’s Bruce Pearl, kings of coaching in a football-mad state that’s having an identity crisis.
Just friends reuniting. pic.twitter.com/29Mo587sMd
— Michael Casagrande (@ByCasagrande) October 15, 2024
Not saying we’ve swapped moon-landing flags into a full-fledged basketball state, but the evidence is mounting.
Where call-in shows and message boards are in panic mode over their colleagues in the prolate spheroid department, Oats and Pearl are riding high.
Back slaps all around.
And why not? They’re entering a season with Oats coming off the program’s first trip to the Final Four while Pearl has the reigning SEC tournament champs.
Look at the preseason SEC media poll and Alabama’s No. 1 for only the third time in program history. Auburn’s right behind at No. 2.
Speaking of No. 2, that’s Alabama’s preseason AP poll ranking — by far the program’s best October projection. Auburn’s No. 11, the next-highest of the nine total SEC teams in the top 25.
Moving onto No. 3, that’s Auburn’s national ranking in Kem Pomeroy’s advanced-statistics-based forecast. Alabama’s No. 4.
These rankings would blow the mind of a hoops observer from a decade ago. At the height of their football successes, these basketball programs were handcuffed to the middle or bottom half of the SEC standings.
Auburn basketball was 11-20 the year Cam Newton led the Tigers to a BCS national title. Three years later, they were 14-16 when Gus Malzahn’s first team played for a championship.
Conversely, the Tiger football team hasn’t won more than six games since Pearl led Auburn to its first men’s basketball Final Four in 2019. Hugh Freeze’s group is currently 2-4, on pace for a fourth straight losing season.
Alabama’s disparity isn’t quite as pronounced, nor is Auburn’s related. Still, the retirement of Nick Saban and a few straight ugly games has Crimson Tide fans feeling restless entering this weekend’s rivalry game at Tennessee.
From the podium, Oats was asked about the fact his team is ranked ahead of the No. 7 football Tide in the Associated Press poll.
“Look, the level that the football program at Alabama has been at for an extremely long time, particularly since Coach Saban took over, is ridiculous,” Oats said. “So just the amount of times they’ve been ranked No. 1, top 5 is absurd. We’re just trying to get the basketball program up to a championship level. There are six programs at Alabama that have won national championships. Basketball is not one of them. We’re trying to get it to that level. We feel like we’re at a level we can compete for one. It’s really hard to win one.
“But we’re still 18 National Championships behind football.”
In terms of trajectory, it’s hard to argue with the direction of his program versus a still-to-be-determined path of Kalen DeBoer’s football team. The men’s basketball Tide has played in four straight NCAA tournaments for the first time in two decades, claimed a No. 1 overall seed two years ago.
And this year, the Crimson Tide arrives as a legit national title contender after coming 40 minutes from playing for a championship last April.
Auburn’s won two of the last five SEC men’s basketball tournaments while claiming regular-season crowns in 2018 and 2022. Its football team hasn’t won a bowl game in that span — bouncing between losses in the Outback, Citrus, Birmingham and Music City bowls since.
If you compare the résumés of Auburn’s two programs without the school’s name, you’d be hard pressed to call it a football school.
While Alabama still has some room to swing the pendulum, there’s far more balance than the early Saban years. The men’s basketball didn’t win a single NCAA tournament game in a March following a Saban-led football title until the last one in 2020.
But Saban’s gone.
Auburn’s a few generations of football coach since they’ve been the kind of consistent winner Pearl’s been since arriving in 2014.
So, is Alabama … dare I say it … becoming a basketball state?
Almost.
Maybe?
At least, it’s closer than ever.
