College basketball players and coaches who play and work in the Deep South live in the shadow of college football. It's a fact of life because football is a way of life around here.
That's true 12 months a year, when college football teams are playing games and when they're not, even during the spring.
From now through April, you're going to see an endless stream of stories on this web site about spring football practice at UAB, Auburn, Alabama and beyond. We're going to write them and you're going to read them for two reasons.
- It's football.
- Basketball isn't doing enough to divert your attention.
Basketball coaches, especially in the SEC footprint, like to publicly compliment football but privately complain about how it blots out the sun, and their frustration is understandable. When your football team's practices get more attention than your basketball team's games, even at tournament time, it's enough to drive you full goose bozo.
But instead of pointing a finger, basketball coaches would be better served to look in the mirror. If your fan base is more engaged in a quarterback battle during spring practice than your appearance in the conference tournament, that's a you problem.
Take Alabama and Auburn. In different ways, this season has been both an improvement and a disappointment for fans of those basketball programs. The Tide and Tigers have won games they shouldn't have won but lost games they shouldn't have lost.
Alabama's flirted with the NCAA Tournament bubble, but that notion has popped as the Tide has dropped to 16-12 overall and 9-7 in the SEC. Auburn's won more games overall than it had since 2009, but there's a strong case to be made that this team's record should be better than 17-12 and 6-10.
UAB hasn't lived up to its preseason expectations, thanks to a 1-6 record in February, which has put the Blazers at 15-14 overall and 8-8 in C-USA.
Is it any wonder that fans of those schools are genuinely more excited about spring football than basketball tournament time?
Because college basketball's a tournament game, there's still time for the Tide, Tigers and/or Blazers to make some noise. Just two years ago, Auburn won three games in the SEC Tournament to reach the semifinals and UAB won the Conference USA Tournament to earn an NCAA Tournament berth.
Basketball is never going to be more popular than football in the Heart of Dixie, but until the basketball teams in this state bring back the good old days, when they roared into March full of promise and potential, spring football practice is going to dominate the headlines.
If you remember the days of Gene Bartow, Wimp Sanderson and Sonny Smith, that's a sad story.