BAMA' SLAMMA: Bama: Sweet, Sweet Home

This rectangle of space has been granted to me every other Thursday provided I talk about Harvard or northeastern-area college sports.

But given my nickname, “Bama’ Slamma,” and the emotions inspired by this weekend’s events, I’d like to respectfully decline that option.

You see, a big part of attending Harvard, a college unmatched in its regional diversity, is representing one’s own home state. As an Alabamian, I’ve caught my share of flak thanks to its clichéd backwardness, Ten Commandments ex-judge Roy Moore and bottom-feeding position out of 49 states (God bless ye, Mississippi) in just about every indicator of statewide health.

Finally, some relief!

I love my home state so much it aches. The people are gentle. The food is sumptuous. The weather is dazzling.

And the basketball? As my dad might say, “I’ll tell you what!”

Just this past weekend, I watched two hometown schools TKO a couple of college hoops giants. First, the University of Alabama—a school known for its rich football tradition and insatiable, self-hating sports fans (myself included)—shocked No. 1 Stanford in Seattle, 70-67, to the dismay of gambling poolsters around Cambridge and the nation.

I was ecstatic. I was hyperventilating. When the Cardinal’s Josh Childress fouled out with 3:16 remaining, I screamed like I was back on an elementary school playground.

A 16-0 run. A go-ahead jumper by Antoine Pettway, the tourney’s official Most Clutch Player. A victory for a team that SI.com’s Grant Wahl said had “absolutely no chance.”

“If Alabama beats Stanford in Round Two,” Wahl wrote, “I’ll shave my head.”

Suffice it to say, I was happy to see the Tide win.

But I felt empty. That night I slipped in and out of a reverie, as green and gold ghosts swirled through my subconscious.

“Why have you left us?” the University of Alabama-Birmingham players in my dreams seemed to say. “Why did you pick the Tide to go to the Sweet 16, and not us?”

Sure I felt bad, but the feeling didn’t last. As usual, I suspended belief that I would actually win bracket money and hunkered down for an infinitely bigger Sunday matchup: UAB vs. Kentucky, another one seed.

You see, I’m an Alabama fan in football, because it’s either them or the other (cough, Auburn) back home. But I was born, and hopefully will grow old, in Birmingham. My grandparents used to take me to UAB Arena (now Bartow Arena) on weekends. Sure, the Blazers would probably lose, but the nachos would be terrific as always.

My soul roots for UAB. So when Mo Finley head-faked a flying Chuck Hayes, stepped forward and drained a game-winning 18-foot jumper with 12 seconds left on Sunday night, I hit basketball nirvana.

“You can’t make this stuff up,” Greg Gumbel said moments later, back in CBS studios after a 76-75 Blazer victory.

I knew I couldn’t have. I had faithfully watched my favorite team lose in its only previous national TV appearances—at Louisville, at Memphis and on a neutral court against DePaul in the C-USA Tournament.

Nonetheless, UAB was absolutely addictive to watch. Ever since they had fired the inept Murray Bartow in 2002 and hired Mike “Forty Minutes of Hell” Anderson away from Arkansas, they have become the most entertaining show in the nation.

They ran. They trapped. They led the nation in steals (two years in a row).

So it was easy to anticipate the Blazer-adoring media onslaught that followed.

“UAB: stands for ‘Upsetting America’s Bracket,’” declared ESPN.com’s Dan Shanoff.

The players—including the affable, charismatic Finley—did their part, charming the media to their side.

Carldell “Squeaky” Johnson, UAB’s dreadlocked, steal-happy point guard, was voted “First Team All-Hair” by ESPN.com.

The Blazers’ identical twin forwards, Ronell and Donell Taylor, stole the hearts of sports fans by combining to make the play of the tournament—a blind, two-handed backwards pass by the former for a one-handed slam on the other end by the latter—that Miami Herald columnist Dan LeBatard called “the top play I’ve seen in this tournament in ten years.”

“UAB,” Shanoff wrote, was “the Most Telegenic Team Left.”

And now, my point. You see, despite my foolhardy pride, my Alabama arrogance, there’s something else at work here.

I’ve been talking up UAB’s Blazers for months. But not any more so because I hail from Bama than because I’d pay to watch them play.

Forget about me. Let’s talk about you. When lovable UAB tips off tomorrow night in St. Louis against the Kansas Jayhawks—NCAA basketball’s equivalent of Rocky IV’s Ivan Drago—remember one important thing.

The Blazers aren’t just my team. They could be yours, too.

Who’d root against that?

—Staff writer Alex McPhillips can be reached at rmcphill@fas.harvard.edu. His column appears on alternate Thursdays.