AUBURN | We are just 12 days away from perhaps the biggest basketball game in the state of Alabama’s history.
And it could be topped three weeks later.
No. 1 Auburn and No. 4 Alabama are on a collision course to face each other twice as top five or top 10 teams over the next five weeks.
The matchups will be key in the race for the regular season SEC championship and will play a big role in earning a No. 1 seed in the upcoming NCAA Tournament.
The two in-state rivals have met as ranked teams just seven previous times since the series began in 1924, but never with both in the top 10.
But that’s set to change this year as both programs have risen to the top of the SEC. In the last seven seasons, the Tigers and Tide have combined for eight SEC championships with both programs winning two regular season and two tournament titles apiece.
While Auburn and Alabama haven’t historically played a lot of nationally-relevant games, there have been plenty of big games played inside the state due to Birmingham being a regular host site for NCAA Regionals through 1997.
Perhaps the biggest came in 1982 when Louisville beat UAB 75-68 in the 1982 Mideast Regional final to earn a trip to the Final Four two days after the Blazers knocked off No. 1 seed Virginia. Georgetown would beat the Cardinals in the semifinals and then lose to freshman Michael Jordan and North Carolina in the title game.
There was also a huge game in 1985 when Auburn lost to North Carolina in the Sweet 16 at the BJCC. Villanova won the Southeast Regional that year and eventually beat Georgetown in one of the biggest finals upsets of all time, shooting a record 78.6 percent from the floor.
There was also a memorable matchup between Kentucky and North Carolina in the 1995 Regional Final and Arizona began its run of beating three No. 1 seeds and winning the national championship by beating Kansas in the 1997 Southeast Regional.
But it’s going to be tough to top a meeting between the state’s two major programs when they’re both ranked in the top five.
Auburn is leading the way in the SEC with a perfect 8-0 record and Alabama is right behind at 8-1. Other programs including Missouri (6-2), Texas A&M (6-3) and Florida (5-3) are still very much in the race but the Tigers and Tide are the clear frontrunners.
Alabama’s lone conference loss was at home to Ole Miss, and if the in-state rivals end up splitting their two games, the regular season championship will come down to how they fare against the rest.
Excluding each other, Auburn closes out the season against five ranked teams including three on the road, and Alabama five ranked teams including two on the road.
They’ll play each other Feb. 15 in Coleman Coliseum, where Auburn has won three times in the last 10 years, and close out the regular season March 8 in Neville Arena, where Alabama has won three times in the last 10 years.
The college basketball world will be watching.
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In today’s musical journey, we go back 40 years to the first song accompanied by a gospel choir to climb to the top of the charts. On Feb. 2, 1985, Foreigner’s power ballad, “I Want to Know What Love Is,” rose to No. 1 on the Billboard 100 for the first of two weeks. The New Jersey Mass Choir and Broadway star Jennifer Holliday provided backing vocals on the song, and Tom Bailey from the Thompson Twins played keyboards. Foreigner guitarist Mick Jones wrote the song about going through a divorce and eventually meeting and marrying his second wife, Ann Dexter-Jones. The song was released Nov. 21, 1984 as the first single from Foreigner’s fifth album, Agent Provocateur. It reached No. 1 in eight other countries including the UK, Canada, Australia, Norway and Sweden. It is ranked by Rolling Stone as the 479th best song of all-time and is the band’s biggest hit song and only one to reach No. 1 in the U.S. It has been covered by several other artists including Wynonna Judd and Mariah Carey.
Foreigner was formed in New York City in 1976 by Jones, who held rehearsals after leaving the Leslie West band. Jones and manager Bud Prager hired vocalist Lou Gramm, multi-instrumentalist Ian McDonald, keyboardist Al Greenwood, drummer Dennis Elliott and bassist Ed Gagliardi. Gramm was previously with Black Sheep, which was opening for Kiss on tour before an accident destroyed their equipment and they had to pull out. The band chose Foreigner because it consisted of three artists from America and three from Britain so they would be foreigners in any country they visited. They rehearsed for six months before recording and releasing their self-titled album in 1977. It was a huge success with three hit singles in “Feels Like the First Time,” “Cold as Ice” and “Long, Long Way from Home.” They went on to record nine albums and have a number of other hit songs including 1978’s “Double Vision” and “Hot Blooded,” 1979’s “Head Games” and “Dirty White Boy,” 1981’s “Waiting for a Girl Like You,” “Urgent” and “Juke Box Hero,” 1987’s “Say You Will” and 1988’s “I Don’t Want to Live Without You.” Gramm left the band in 1990, returned in 92 and left again in 2003. Foreigner has sold more than 80 million albums worldwide. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2024.
