By Hunter Ford

Alabama basketball needs to take a play from the football program’s playbook and hire a proven head coach with a national championship under his belt.

The Crimson Tide football program has excelled since it hired Nick Saban.  The basketball program needs to hire away the head basketball coach from the University of Connecticut.  No, I’m not talking about the men’s coach Kevin Ollie; I believe Alabama should go after UConn women’s head coach Geno Auriemma.

Auriemma recently cut the nets down after an historic undefeated season and recorded his ninth national championship.   If Alabama wants to take its basketball program to another level, it must have a coach like Auriemma.  I doubt that a head coach from a prominent men’s program would even consider moving to a perennial also-ran like Alabama.  But Auriemma might consider the challenge of taking the Crimson Tide men to the promised land of hoops- if someone would only ask.

The gold standard for Alabama basketball was set by Wimp Sanderson in the 1980s and early 1990s.  Wimp guided the Tide to four SEC Tournament titles and eight NCAA Tournament appearances.  In his 12 seasons, Sanderson’s teams averaged 21.8 wins per year and made the Sweet Sixteen five times.

That is really modest success compared to true top-tier programs like Kentucky, Duke and UConn.  But it’s the best Alabama has ever been.

Mark Gottfried finally broke the Sweet Sixteen bubble by making the Elite Eight in the 2003-04 season, and he took Alabama to five straight NCAA appearances during his tenure.  Gottfried’s downfall was his mediocre SEC record.  In his ten full seasons (he resigned midway through the 2008-09 campaign) Gottfried’s teams were only above .500 in the SEC three times.  He was 8-8 in SEC play the season he took the Tide to the Elite Eight.

My point is that Alabama, even in its Sanderson-led glory days, has never been a true top-tier program.  The only way to change that is to hire a proven, national championship-caliber head coach.  Once again, Alabama is unlikely to hire away a coach like that from a men’s program.  Why not think outside the box?

I realize there are two big problems here.  One is that we still have to wait another season for the Anthony Grant era to play out.  Two is Auriemma may not want the Alabama job even if it were offered to him.  At 60 years old, he is entrenched and well-loved at UConn.

I supported Bill Battle’s decision to keep Grant for another season.  However, I’m not optimistic about the chances that Grant will turn things around.

Auriemma was recently interviewed by Sports Illustrated.  He was asked what goals are left for him professionally.  “I don’t know,” Auriemma replied.  “I have never been a goal-setter.  Maybe that’s why I didn’t get a lot of A’s in school.  I just take a look at what’s in front of me, and I try to do that.”

He was asked by SI what he tells his players when they hear the hype of being preseason No. 1 for next season.  His response:

“We, as coaches, always talk out of both sides of our mouth.  So to you and any other media that asks, I’m going to say, ‘You have to be kidding me?  We just lost two All-Americans, two of the best players to ever play at Connecticut, and you are telling me we are not going to miss a beat?  You guys must be out of your minds.’  Then I walk into our locker room and say, ‘Yo, guys, we are going to be pre-season No. 1 and anybody who doesn’t vote us preseason No. 1, we are going to kick their asses because this is Connecticut and we better be preseason No. 1.’  You play both angles depending on your audience.  But I think if you come to Connecticut, that is always the expectation.”

In the SI interview, Auriemma was not asked if he would consider an offer to coach a men’s Division I basketball program.  If things line up right at the end of next basketball season, I hope Bill Battle will ask him.

10 thoughts on “UA basketball should steal UConn coach”

  1. grant could be great – just needs to settle into normalcy as long as he balances offense with great d

  2. what needs to happen for alabama basketball goes deeper than hiring any coach.

    a commitment needs to be made. a commitment to championship basketball. a commitment to building a championship program.

    wanna talk UConn? go back to the hiring of Jim Calhoun. UConn b’ball was on the rocks. they hired Calhoun, built a new arena and went about doing whatever it took to bring championships to Storrs.

    i’ve followed alabama basketball for going on 40 years. i’m frankly tired of watching the half ass effort alabama puts into the sport. i’m tired of “waiting ’til next year”.

    sick of it. sick of the potato head we have down there now.

    if you’re not gonna play for it all, why play at all?

  3. Agreed Finebammer LOL where did you get potato head from?

    Grant was sposed to be a championship guy… but he was an assistant… You have to change the culture… I totally agree.

    Alabama football has never really needed a culture change… it was a winner from the beginning.

    Basketball needs something else. If Florida can do it why can’t Alabama.???

  4. Hunter,

    I can appreciate what you say in your article because you want your team to win. Poaching the best womens basketball coach of all time and putting him into a mediocre program like Alabama is not an appealing option for either side in my opinion. For Alabama, this would be a media circus and it would take 2-3 years to recruit and get his players installed to really have a chance. Men and women play the game differently and the type of game that Auriemma has been so successful with may or may not work for mens basketball. For Auriemma, you are talking about a guy who will own every record there is to have in women’s basketball. He has never coached anywhere else. It’d be like Babe Ruth playing for the Boston Braves to finish his career. He has nothing else to prove.

    Men’s college basketball is all about pedigree. The elite programs are that way because they have a track record of sending players to the next level. For years, UConn, Duke, UNC and Kentucky have led the ranks of alumni in the NBA. That’s what gets through to recruits from Los Angeles and New York City where the majority of the basketball talent pipeline comes from. Hire someone who can speak from experience as a player or who has a proven track record of getting players to the NBA. That will begin to help with rebuilding the basketball program, not poaching the most successful womens coach of all time.

  5. Dan,

    Therein lies the big question, and problem, that Alabama has concerning basketball. What coach with the kind of pedigree you are talking about would be willing to take on the challenge of taking Crimson Tide men’s basketball to the next level?

  6. That is the most rediculous thing I have heard in quite a while! How in hell can coaching a bunch of nappy headed dykes translate to coaching me!?!?

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