Bama Central

A Historic Day for Three Alabama Sports: Roll Call, May 26, 2024

Your daily briefing on what's going on with Alabama Athletics, including full TV listings.

Hunter De Siver

Filip Planinsek
Filip Planinsek / Obtained from Alabama Tennis' X/Twitter

Alabama men's tennis' No. 29-ranked Filip Planinsek took down Columbia's No. 23-ranked Michael Zheng in three sets of the NCAA Singles Championship to claim the first title in Crimson Tide history.

"I mean, just all that thanks to the coaches, the staff, Katie (Wheeler - athletic trainer), just amazing," Planinsek said after the match. "I mean, I can't thank them enough. My family, I'm just thrilled."

Nevertheless, this was a hard-fought victory, as Planinsek started on the wrong side of the scoreboard. Planinsek opened the first set with a 5-3 lead, but Zheng came back to win 7-6 after a 7-4 tiebreaker.

"I just felt that I can win the next two sets," Planinsek said when asked about dropping the opening set in a tiebreaker. "I was confident of that, and I broke quite early in the second set and then momentum started building. I started building my game. I started being more aggressive."

Alabama head coach George Husack couldn't have been more proud of Planinsek as he took a moment before answering a question about the national champion during the post-match press conference.

"So incredibly proud of and happy for Filip," Husack said. "What a week and one that he took ownership of the minute we returned from Duke. He created his own plan for the coaches and support staff to follow and kept moving forward. Filip became such a better competitor during this month because of how he pushed himself in practice, how he executed under pressure, how he took advantage of opportunities, how he kept his cool in both challenging and frustrating moments, and ultimately how he never stopped leading himself. He played for himself, his family and the University of Alabama. We are so proud of him and this historic first for our program. There ain't no mountain high enough and Filip will continue climbing."

While one historic moment is more than enough for a school in one day, the Crimson Tide had two more sports reach the record books on Saturday in softball and track and field.

Today's Crimson Tide Schedule:

  • Men's Golf: NCAA Championships, Carlsbad, Calif.
  • Softball: NCAA Super Regional at No. 3 Tennessee, Game Three, 3 p.m. CT, ESPN

Crimson Tide Results:

  • Track and Field: Several more tickets were punched on Saturday to the National Championships in Eugene, Ore.
  • Na’Taja Ballard, Ariike Elijah, Milan Fields and Caelyn Harris of the women’s 4x100m relay become the Tide's third relay squad headed to Nationals as the group clocked a season-best 43.87
  • Doris Lemngole (3,000-meter steeplechase) cruised to a 9:28.91 time to break the NCAA Track and Field East Prelim record
  • Hilda Olemomoi (5,000-meter) punches her second ticket, with a 15:19.57 time to break the NCAA Track and Field East Prelim record

Did You Notice?

  • Shortly before its NCAA Super Regional game against Tennessee, the Alabama softball team congratulated Planinsek.
  • After taking down Tennessee with a walk-off single in the 14th inning, Alabama outfielder Kristen White was helped by her teammates during the postgame interview.
  • Alabama softball head coach Patrick Murphy was fired up after defeating Tennessee.

Countdown to the Crimson Tide's Season Opener

97 days

On This Day in Crimson Tide History:

May 26, 1964: Peter Finney reports in the New Orleans paper from the SEC spring meeting in Mobile that Alabama coach Paul Bryant is looking much healthier than a year ago when the Bama coach was in the midst of his battle with The Saturday Evening Post. Finney reports Bryant has settled out of court for $300,000 tax free. The publication is still in appeals trying to reduce the money it owes to Wally Butts who was awarded $10 million.

May 26, 1965: Future Crimson Tide baseball coach Mitch Gaspard was born in Port Arthur, Texas.

May 26, 1983: Former Alabama defensive lineman Mark Anderson was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

May 26, 1988: William Vlachos was born.

May 26, 2019: Legendary quarterback Bart Starr died in Birmingham. He was 85.

Crimson Tide Quote of the Day:

“Show class, have pride and display character. If you do, winning takes care of itself.” — Paul W. “Bear” Bryant

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Hunter De Siver

HUNTER DE SIVER

Hunter De Siver is a graduate from the University of Alabama, earning a degree in sports media. During his time in Tuscaloosa, Hunter distributed articles covering Alabama football, basketball, and baseball for WVUA 23 TV and discussed these topics on Tide 100.9 FM. Hunter also generated articles highlighting Crimson Tide products in the NFL and NBA for BamaCentral. Since graduation, he's been contributing a plethora of NFL and NBA stories for FanNation and is a staff writer at MizzouCentral, Cowbell Corner and is back at BamaCentral.

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