SEC threatens fans with eviction for wearing shirts who joke about Brandon Miller’s role in deadly shooting

Warning: The following story contains imagery.

The Brandon Miller situation in Alabama exposed some of the uglier aspects of collegiate sports culture, and they came out loud and clear at the SEC men’s basketball tournament.

With Miller still playing despite delivering a weapon used in a fatal gunfight earlier this year, the Crimson Tide advanced to the finals with a 72-61 win over Missouri on Saturday. Present was a man wearing an Alabama T-shirt that read “GOATS” on the front and “Killin’ our way through the SEC in ’23” on the back.

When AL.com’s John Talty was asked about the jersey, the man replied profanely, claiming to be an Alabama fan and saying he would be back for the Tide’s championship game against Texas A&M on Sunday.

An SEC spokesman later told AL.com that fans would not be admitted to Sunday’s finals wearing such a shirt and would be asked to exit if they put it on at any point:

The shirt is an apparent reference to Miller’s legal saga, in which the newcomer star supplied former teammate Darius Miles with a gun that was later used to kill 23-year-old mother Jamea Harris on January 15. Miles and Michael Davis, the man who allegedly fired the gun, both face murder charges, while Miller has not been charged with a felony because prosecutors said there was no evidence he knew the gun was used for a crime when he handed her to Miles late at a nightclub.

The case also rose before the game when a couple of hecklers in Vanderbilt shirts yelled “Brandon Killer,” “You’re a killer and you know it,” and “God will judge you” at him during the warm-up.

The story goes on

Miller, who described the situation as “heartbreaking” earlier this week, has seen no consequences from Alabama continuing to play, a decision condemned by Harris’ parents. However, he received a setback for a pre-game introduction where a teammate pretended to tap him out and was constantly booed in the street.