SEC basketball programs ranked by all time wins (thru games played 01/25/25)

in amazed we are they high without winning a title

I bought season tickets back in the Auburn-Chris Porter days and I'm pretty sure my purchase at that time for 2 SEASON tickets was around $200 to $250.

NCAAT wins are the ones that matter IMO

With the exception of Frank McGuire (preseason No. 1 1969 and undefeated ACC championship 69-70) and a couple of years with Fogler we have been mired in mediocracy and lathered in failure. The Frank Martin final four run was even wasted with nothing to follow it up. I really like Lamont Paris...but geez....

Arkansas didn't have a basketball program until the 1920s.

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I was talking with my son about how 25-30 years ago you could go to Beard-Eaves on fame game day, but a ticket for like $5 or $10 bucks, even an SSC game, and walk right in. The transformation Bruce Pearl has brought to Auburn men’s basketball cannot be overstated.

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As an Alabama fan with a strong family connection to the Alabama basketball program (have two relatives who played basketball for Alabama), I grew up going to Alabama basketball games a little kid in the 80s. I mention that to say that I've always been just as big of a basketball fan as a football fan and I remember how good Alabama basketball (and Auburn basketball to a lesser degree) was when I was a kid in the 80s. Contrary to popular belief, Alabama fans historically have more or less supported basketball as much or more than any SEC fanbase not named Kentucky, Arkansas, or perhaps Tennessee but fanbase wide support has significantly trailed football for obvious reasons in the same way for example as Tennessee which to me has a practically identical basketball history to Alabama.

Fast forward to about 10 years ago when Auburn was searching for a coach and Alabama was contemplating the same. I remember a lot of Alabama fans like myself really wanting to go after Pearl to beat Auburn to the punch but many of the naysayers in our fanbase and other fanbases as well making a big deal of Pearl's show cause suggesting he was damaged goods. Yes, it was a serious blackmark on his resume but one that was way overblown in my humble opinion.

Bottom line is that Bruce Pearl is far and away the smartest Auburn hire in my lifetime. I'll admit as an Alabama fan I was jealous of the hire. Hiring BP was a brilliant and in some ways even a brave move on Auburn's part given a lot of the pushback hiring BP was getting in the media at the time. I'd even go so far as saying it's ALMOST as impactful as Alabama's hiring of Saban given where each respective program (Auburn basketball and Alabama football) were at the time and given where those two coaches have elevated the programs to. Obviously, the Alabama football program as one of the top 3 or 4 greatest programs historically
of all time was a sleeping giant that was just an elite coach or even a very good coach away from being amongst the elite of the elite again while Auburn basketball to put it kindly was a below average program historically but the impacts each respective hire has made are comprarable. The 1999/2000 Auburn basketball team though an abberation was nonetheless proof that Auburn basketball could at the very least catch lightning in a bottle and that Auburn fans would support a winning basketball team. With BP's leadership, some early success, and his ability to build a program the fan support increased and Auburn made perhaps the 2nd smartest decision in my lifetime which was to go all in and invest a nice new arena. Weirdly enough what was one of the worst programs historically in the SEC program playing in one of the most embarrassing arenas in the league has quietly over the past 10 years turned into one of the Top 10 or 15 college basketball programs in the country with a Cameron Indoor like home atmosphere.

Are you one of the new figs that didn’t know how historically bad our bball team is?

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Pretty wild that Bama and Auburn have two of the best basketball coaches in America at the same time. I’ve watched Bama basketball for 50 years and we’ve been good before, but two basketball teams this good in a football crazy state is very cool.

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Same here, I've watch Bama basketball for nearly 45 years and this is far and away the best both programs have been at the same time and in the same season. It's a bit like the basketball version of football in the State of Mississippi in 2014 when Mississippi State and Ole Miss reached #1 and #3 respectively in the polls that season. Although I'd argue that the Alabama and Auburn basketball programs themselves have reached a higher level than the Mississippi State and Ole Miss football programs had reached at that point.

Francis Schmidt was the first head coach.