No disrespect to Georgia football coach Kirby Smart, who just guided the Bulldogs to their first national championship in 41 years, but the guy he just beat to claim that crown – Alabama’s Nick Saban – is almost universally regarded as that sport’s best coach of this time, if not of all-time.
But could the best college basketball coach of this season, at the very least, also reside in Alabama, though roughly 97 miles to the east of Saban’s Tuscaloosa home?
Has anyone, anywhere ever done a better job of turning a football school into a basketball behemoth than Auburn’s Bruce Pearl, whose Tigers are ranked No. 1 for the first time in school history in the newest Associated Press poll?
Beyond that, if you can get past his occasional missteps with the NCAA at every Division I program he’s coached, is there anyone, anywhere more certain to not only build a winning program, but build one that wildly excites its fan base than Bruce Almighty?
Because winning and making it fun to watch aren’t the same things. If so, former Tennessee coach Cuonzo Martin – the man whose unfortunate task it was to follow Pearl at UT when he was forced out due to NCAA violations – might still call Knoxville home.