Schools that have accounted for college football’s past two national champions meet in basketball Thursday night when Alabama hosts Florida.
Crimson Tide first-year coach Anthony Grant is a former assistant to Florida counterpart Billy Donovan, and the two share a coincidence with their respective football programs. Donovan was several games into his first season at Florida when the Gators won the 1996 national title under Steve Spurrier, as was Grant last month when Nick Saban led the Tide to their first crown since ’92.
“A lot of people think sometimes that’s a negative thing, but I think any time you’ve got a great football program that you can have a great basketball program,” Donovan said Monday. “I think that they help each other in a lot of ways. I think we’ve proven that here, and Ohio State and Texas and Michigan have proven that.
“There are a lot of really, really good football and basketball schools, and I think probably 15 or 20 years ago that there was this adage that you couldn’t be successful in both sports.”
Donovan believes Grant inherited a program with more tradition than Florida had back in ’96.
“You look at the job Coach (C.M.) Newton did while he was there,” Donovan said. “You go back to Wimp Sanderson when he was there and the job Mark Gottfried did — think about some of the players who have come through Alabama’s program. It is mind-boggling the success they’ve had.”
Downey keeps rolling
South Carolina’s Devan Downey was an obvious choice for SEC player of the week after tallying 30 points in last Tuesday’s upset of Kentucky and 33 in Saturday’s win over Georgia. The 5-foot-9, 170-pound senior guard has tallied 30 or more points in three straight league games — he had 36 against Florida on Jan. 23 — and five of seven overall.
“Downey just went nuts at the end of the game and made two impossible shots,” Kentucky coach John Calipari said. “They were bad shots, and he made them anyway.”
The Gamecocks are off until Saturday, when they visit Tennessee.
“He obviously is in a complete and total zone,” Vols coach Bruce Pearl said. “He does whatever he wants to do on the basketball floor, and no individual or team has been able to slow him down or stop him.”
Sinking even further
LSU dropped to 0-7 in league play with Saturday’s 67-51 loss at Mississippi State. The Tigers are averaging 51 points in SEC road games and are home this week to face Tennessee and Kentucky.
“Obviously we’re still having our woes and are struggling to score,” Tigers coach Trent Johnson said. “I find that ironic because against Tennessee, we’re going to honor and celebrate the 40th anniversary of Pete Maravich breaking Oscar Robertson’s scoring record. Against Kentucky on Saturday, we’re going to retire Rudy Macklin’s jersey.
“Those are two pretty special players and could score, so I’d like to have half of them going into these two upcoming games.”
League coach-speak
South Carolina coach Darrin Horn on the Georgia Bulldogs being 1-5 in SEC play: “They’ve got to be the best one-win team of any team in any conference right now.” … Calipari on the similarities of Memphis and Kentucky: “Everywhere we go, it’s someone’s sellout, and everywhere we go, we’re getting everybody’s best shot.”