ARLINGTON, TX - SEPTEMBER 05: Head coach Nick Saban of the Alabama Crimson Tide looks on as his team prepares to take on the Wisconsin Badgers during The Advocare Classic at AT&T Stadium on September 5, 2015 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images) BATON ROUGE, LA - OCTOBER 03: Head coach Les Miles of the LSU Tigers watches from the sideline during the game against the Eastern Michigan Eagles at Tiger Stadium on October 3, 2015 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
LSU and Alabama are two of the biggest rivals in all of football despite the fact that the Crimson Tide have won four national titles since the Tigers' last one. Not only do the two schools duke it out in the SEC year in and year out, but they battle for recruits -- and big recruits at that.
Four-star cornerback Shyheim Carter, an Alabama commit, is from the state of Louisiana, but he dislikes LSU strongly. So much so that the Tigers weren't even in his top three schools.
"When I signed with Alabama, LSU fans, they were bad-mouthing me a lot, just because I was an in-state prospect," Carter said, via SEC Country.
Carter never even gave LSU any thought.
"Nah, I just don't like 'em," he said. "There's something about 'em I just don't like. I mean, LSU's a great school, phenomenal school, but it's just something personal I don't like about 'em."
Nick Saban, given his track record, is a coach just about every high school recruit wants to play for. Carter will get the chance to do so this season, and had Saban still been at LSU, things would have changed.
"LSU wasn't even top three," Carter's mother said. "If [Saban would] have went back to LSU, it would've been the No. 1. I'm serious. He would follow that man."
It's well known that Saban has pull with recruits, but this is extremely telling. Had he been at LSU, Carter likely would have gone there. Instead, he didn't even consider the Tigers.
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