Auburn and the ASHOF

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Alabama hall needs more Auburn coaches

Friday, May 19, 2006

It's Alabama Sports Hall of Fame Weekend. Time for a shout-out and a primal scream.

This time, it's an Auburn thing.

It's about time they got around to inducting Joe Ciampi. The best women's basketball coach in state history is one of the best mentors that game has seen from sea to shining sea.

Consider some highlights. Four SEC regular-season titles. Four SEC Tournament titles. Sixteen NCAA Tournaments. Ten Sweet 16s. Six Elite Eights. Three Final Fours and three national championship games - in a row.

Ciampi set standards no other basketball coach in this state can hope to approach, let alone reach. He's as much of a slam dunk for this honor as his old friend, Charles Barkley.

So why was Ciampi inducted into the national Women's Basketball Hall of Fame first? Why did he have to wait until after retirement, which is not a requirement, for the ASHOF?

At least he's here at last. When will this state recognize his Auburn counterpart on the men's side, Sonny Smith?

Long before he was a friendly and funny radio host, Smith was a friendly and funny basketball coach. He's wondered if his sense of humor has caused people not to take his work seriously.

Take this: Smith led the Auburn men to their first five NCAA trips - in five straight seasons - their first Sweet 16 run and their only Elite Eight trip.

He's the only coach to groom Chuck Person, the best college basketball player in state history, as well as Barkley, the greatest pro.

Person and Barkley are Hall of Famers so obvious not even this state could snub them. It's way past time for their college coach to join them. He should've been there waiting for them.

Smith's not alone on the outside looking in. You could fill a new wing with deserving Auburn coaches alone.

How about the head coach who's won more national championships than anyone else in state history, including Paul Bryant?

That's right. Auburn swimming coach David Marsh, with 10 national titles to his credit, is not in the ASHOF, and that's wrong on land or sea.

Marsh's teams have won six men's national titles, the last four in a row, and four women's national crowns, all in the last five years. Three times, including this year, his men's and women's teams have won it all in the same season.

Anyone who doesn't consider those to be Hall of Fame credentials is - wait for it - all wet.

Or, in the case of electors who've yet to tap former Auburn baseball coach Hal Baird, out in left field.

Six years after retiring, Baird is sixth in the SEC record book with 634 wins. All he did to get there was tutor a two-time MVP in Frank Thomas, a rookie of the year in Gregg Olson and an All-Star Game MVP named Bo.

It's never too early to start thinking about next year, so here's a friendly reminder to the voters who've been sleeping on Baird, Marsh and Smith.

It may be called the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.

But don't forget about Auburn.