Full disclosure: It’s late Saturday night. Everyone in this house is asleep except for the guy whose fingerprint unlocks the laptop and can’t sleep until writing a little more about what we saw today.

This is March.

That’s both the social media reminder of the madness and my headline from last Saturday’s introduction to the mayhem. It was a column about Alabama’s soul-sucking, buzzer-beating loss at Tennessee. Regular season losses don’t get much more impactful either on the standings or the soul.

It was enough to give Auburn the outright SEC championship, feed online trolling and give AU Athletics the lead time to print league title towels for this Saturday’s visit from Alabama.

So there was something full circle about Crimson Tide players getting pelted by the softest projectile — one printed as a clear and justifiable taunt — after it beat the buzzer to stun the suddenly angry home crowd.

The 93-91 Alabama win in Neville Arena was one for the ages. It was enough to stir some insomnia writing so here are a few bonus thoughts and observations from the final Saturday of a historic regular season. First, a few on the final play.

— Can we appreciate the fact Alabama won this one by defying the analytics? Nate Oats wants a shot at the rim or from 3, so the fact Mark Sears’ mid-range runner was the signature moment is … something.

— It’s also fitting that the two best players on the floor made the closing statements for their respective teams. Johni Broome’s 3-pointer tied the game seconds before Sears’ runner ended it. Those statements followed two completely different games for both. Broome was the straw that stirred Auburn’s drink with 34 points on 15-for-28 shooting. Sears finished with just nine points as Auburn locked him down almost all game. He managed just nine shots. Only five times this season did he shoot it fewer times while his shot count’s been as high as 24 (Wednesday against Florida).

— There’s something to say about how great Auburn’s defense was on Sears … until the final seconds. Nothing was easy at any point in the day for Sears but the best ball-handler/top scorer got a largely undisturbed shot at the buzzer? A horrible time for a breakdown for one of the elite defenses nationally.

— The final moment of overtime was quite different from the final sequence of the first half. Sears found no daylight with Denver Jones playing tighter than his shadow. A rushed 3-pointer never had a chance as the shot clock expired. It was a demoralizing end to an otherwise fruitful first half.

— This game was a classic regardless of your affiliation. The first game between the two was a dud if you like good theater. Auburn jumped to that 9-0 lead and never trailed. It was only tied twice and the Tigers pulled away both times with the lead swelling as high as 14 points. This time, the game was tied 10 times, lead swapped hands 13 times and nobody led by more than eight points. They traded punches all afternoon and one team won it as opposed to the other team blowing it.

— Let’s also talk about the crimson crane and it’s indelible place in this basketball rivalry. Born on the football field and coopted by the basketball counterparts, Auburn’s used it to mock Alabama. That included after the February beating of the Tide in Coleman Coliseum. So the moment Grant Nelson (of all people) dropped it on Broome in the first half really injected some energy into this one. Bruce Pearl lost his mind trying to recreate it for the referees in a plea for a T, but no dice. The Auburn radio crew also verbally disagreed with the lack of a penalty but, from my perspective, it’s all fair game in a rivalry like this. You better believe there would be cranes all over the floor if Auburn won it so, fair play, you give and receive. This time, Nelson wrote a check that he certainly cashed.

— Almost lost in the shuffle was the performance of Labaron Philon. His pickpocket of fellow star freshman Tahaad Pettiford in overtime led to a tiebreaking layup with 2:10 to play. He also calmly hit a pair of free throws with 30 seconds left to put the Tide up 3. The former 5-star (and one-time Auburn commit) scored 15 points in his seventh double-figure scoring performance in the last eight games.

— Lost even further was the offensive outing by Clifford Omoruyi. His 15 points came one shy of a season high and was three better than his previous best against SEC competition. The Rutgers transfer was 7-for-7 shooting. That was his 14th game this season in which he didn’t miss a shot but he previously topped out at 6-for-6 against a completely overmatched UNC Ashville team. The big crimson dog did this against one of the more physically intimidating front lines in the sport and he had at least two poster dunks.

— There’s not much more to add on the Chad Baker-Mazara ejection for the cheap shot elbow. The veteran is a great asset when his emotion feeds Auburn runs but this isn’t the first time that adrenaline redlined and cost the Tigers.

— Alabama had been keeping the turnovers under control recently. It had just six Wednesday against Florida before ballooning to 15 on Saturday. The Tigers forced just six in the first meeting but Neville Arena has a way of speeding opponents up and forcing mistakes. Those giveaways led to 20 Auburn points while the Tide scored just 10 off the nine Auburn turnovers.

— The Crimson Tide didn’t attempt a 3-pointer for the first 5:30. That’s a testament to Auburn’s perimeter defense considering Alabama attempts the sixth-most 3-pointers in the nation (29.6 a game). Alabama finished 7-for-22 from long range. That’s the fifth fewest attempts and sixth fewest makes of Alabama’s season.

— The visitors made up for the lack of production from deep by making 62% of its 2-point shots. It outscored the Tigers 52-40 in the paint while making 18 of 30 shots taken around the rim.

— With Alabama winning, it lessened the chances of a rematch with Auburn in the SEC tournament. The Tide now gets the No. 3 seed, meaning the two couldn’t meet before the league championship. A loss would have sent Alabama to the No. 4 seed, meaning the two would have to win just one game apiece to reunite in the semifinals on Saturday in Nashville.

That’s enough for now.

The fever dream of March basketball is really about to get trippy so it’s time for some sleep. That was perhaps the greatest roundball meeting of these two blood rivals when you consider the pure theater of the full 45 minutes.

That shouldn’t be lost in any of this.

So good night, hope you slept tight, because it’s about to get real now that we’re looking at brackets.

Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.