Alabama and Auburn Basketball Top 25 Ranking Tracker and Heading to Phoenix Bobbleheads Unveiled

This morning, in conjunction with the 2024-25 college basketball season, the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum unveiled first-of-its-kind Alabama Crimson Tide and Auburn Tigers Basketball Top 25 Ranking Tracker Bobbleheads as well as a very special Alabama Big Al Headed to Phoenix Bobblehead commemorating Alabama’s 2024 Final Four appearance, which was the first in program history. The unique ranking tracker bobbleheads will let fans change the team’s ranking each week for many years to come. The officially licensed bobbleheads are being produced by the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum, an official licensee of the University of Alabama and Auburn University.

Auburn is currently ranked #4 in the AP Top 25 and #3 in the Coaches Poll while Alabama is #8 in the AP Top 25 and #7 in the Coaches Poll. Auburn has gotten off to a 4-0 start and will take on the 5th ranked Iowa State Cyclones on Monday in the Maui Invitational. Alabama has started the season with a 4-1 record and will take on 7th ranked Houston on Tuesday night and 24th ranked Rutgers on Wednesday night in Las Vegas for the Players Era Festival.

• Released in conjunction with the 2024-25 college basketball season, the bobbleheads are now available in the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum’s Online Store at this link for Auburn and this link for Alabama.
• The bobbleheads, which are expected to ship in April, are $40 each plus a flat-rate shipping charge of $8 per order.
• Each will be individually numbered to 2,024.
• Standing on a basketball court base, the Aubie the Tiger and Big Al bobbleheads are positioned on a numbered block that can be adjusted when each school’s ranking changes. Each mascot is also holding a basketball with the schools’ logo.
• The Alabama Headed to Phoenix Bobblehead features Big Al in the desert with an Alabama suitcase and basketball and commemorates the Crimson Tide’s first Final Four trip.
• Aubie made his debut in 1979 after first appearing as a cartoon character on the cover of a football program 20 years earlier. A spirit leader and goodwill ambassador for Auburn University, Aubie is a popular character among Auburn fans and one of the most animated mascots in the country. Aubie has won a record-setting 10 mascot national championships, he was named the 2014 Capital One Mascot of the Year and was among the first three collegiate mascots inducted into the Mascot Hall of Fame on August 15th, 2006. It is often said: “Women love him, children adore him, and men want to be him.”
• Big Al, the costumed elephant mascot of the University of Alabama, made his debut in 1980, but the elephant became UA’s unofficial mascot in the 1930s. On October 8th, 1930, Atlanta Journal sportswriter Everett Strupper wrote a story about the Alabama-Ole Miss game he had witnessed in Tuscaloosa four days earlier. In describing the big, powerful Alabama team coached by Wallace Wade, Strupper wrote: “At the end of the quarter, the earth started to tremble, there was a distant rumble that continued to grow. Some excited fan in the stands bellowed, ‘Hold your horses, the elephants are coming!’ and out stamped the Alabama varsity.” Strupper and other writers would continue to refer to Alabama as the “Red Elephants” with the red as a nod to the players’ crimson jerseys. The name stuck throughout what became a national championship season and beyond. Despite the nickname, it would be nearly five decades before Alabama recognized the animal as its official mascot.
• Auburn is currently ranked #4 in the AP Top 25 and #3 in the Coaches Poll while Alabama is #8 in the AP Top 25 and #7 in the Coaches Poll. Auburn has gotten off to a 4-0 start and will take on the 5th ranked Iowa State Cyclones on Monday in the Maui Invitational. Alabama has started the season with a 4-1 record and will take on 7th ranked Houston on Tuesday night and 24th ranked Rutgers on Wednesday night in Las Vegas for the Players Era Festival.
• “We’re excited to unveil the College Basketball Top 25 Ranking Bobblehead Series and the Big Al Headed to Phoenix Bobblehead in conjunction with the 2024-25 season,” National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum co-founder and CEO Phil Sklar said. “These bobbleheads will be the perfect way for Alabama and Auburn fans to track the team’s ranking each week for many seasons to come and a great way for fans, alumni, students, faculty, and staff to show off their school pride all year long!”
• The National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum, which is located at 170 S. 1st. St. in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, opened to the public on February 1st, 2019. The HOF and Museum also produces high quality, customized bobbleheads for retail sale as well as organizations, individuals, and teams across the country.