The first week of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament was about to end Sunday night and Texas A&M, the last SEC school standing, was down 12 points with less than a minute to go to a school called Northern Iowa University. Their odds of winning at the time, according to the metrics that track such things, were less than 1 percent.

Amazingly, the Aggies rallied to tie the game and then won 92-88 in double overtime.

And all across the SEC geographic footprint, people could not have cared less. And why not? Because it’s basketball, that silly game that fills the calendar between football and spring football.

Across the south, no one cares.

There isn’t a website in America that has a better pulse on the SEC fan. We know at Saturday Down South because we pay attention. You guys like football, half a million of you, and that’s it. That’s outside of Lexington, Ky., of course, which is the one outlier in this discussion. Kentucky is a basketball school, first and foremost, and that’s an extreme rarity in the SEC. They stand alone with that moniker.

And that’s totally, totally wrong.

The SEC is flat-out horrible in basketball right now compared to the other power conferences across the country. Kentucky will always be great, but elsewhere, things aren’t good. SEC commissioner Greg Sankey knows that needs to change, which is why he hired former Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese as a consultant last week, to improve the league’s basketball profile.

Good luck with that.

For the third time in four years, the SEC only had three teams invited to the NCAA tournament, which is laughable for a league like this. The other leagues were getting seven teams. The ACC got seven – and six won twice this weekend to advance to the Sweet Sixteen.

To be honest, the SEC should have only gotten two bids. Many bracket experts were shocked that Vanderbilt made the field, and they were quickly dispatched in a Tuesday play-in game that many people don’t even consider to be part of the tournament.

Others griped that they didn’t get in, but South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Alabama, who had chances, played themselves out of it. None of them deserved to be one of the 36 at-large selections after the 32 automatic qualifiers. That’s pathetic.

This tournament will go on, but most SEC folks really won’t pay attention now, outside of the Aggies diehards. But that’s not the way it should be. SEC basketball not only should be better, it has to be better.

Sankey knows it. Tranghese knows it. So does every SEC athletic director for that matter, because there’s major money to be made with quality basketball and that has to chance.

And it’s time for the SEC to start taking advantage of it.

Kentucky basketball is a cash cow, so we’ll leave them out of this conversation. Florida has seen the financial benefits of basketball during the Billy Donovan era that included two national championships. The rest of the league? Really, let’s be honest. Basketball is an afterthought.

As the typical SEC fan, you can tell me who the third-string quarterback is at Texas A&M, but you can’t name a single starter on the basketball team. You’ll throw down thousands of dollars for football season tickets and booster donations, but you won’t drop $10 to go watch a basketball game. You’ll watch “Dukes of Hazzard” reruns before you’ll watch a Wednesday night basketball game on the SEC Network.

That’s your prerogative, of course. But it shouldn’t be.

Sankey is right. The SEC needs to be taking basketball more seriously. Especially with serious programming needs on the SEC Network, quality basketball every night would help ad sales dramatically.

Some are trying, of course. Big-name coaches – Ben Howland, Bruce Pearl, Rick Barnes and Avery Johnson – have been hired recently. New arenas – Ole Miss, Florida – are popping up. Recruiting budgets – and subsequent recruiting successes – are happening.

That’s all good. But there needs to be more.

There are all sorts of universities across the country that do well in both sports. That’s the way it should be. And that’s the way it should be in the SEC. You pound your chest all the time about being the best.

Well, go be he best in basketball, too. It can be done.

Just go prove it.