The way James Franklin told it, he and his family were in Destin, Fla., the favorite vacation spot of college football coaches near and far, when he saw an opportunity. Vanderbilt was playing in the SEC Baseball Tournament championship game, and though he left Vandy for Penn State 12 years ago, he still has a special place in his heart for the school that gave him his first chance to be a head coach.

It helped that, during his three years in Nashville, Franklin developed a friendship with Vanderbilt baseball coach Tim Corbin.

So Franklin hit the road early Sunday, and there was the Penn State football coach, standing in the Vanderbilt dugout as the Commodores took down Ole Miss 3-2 to win their third SEC Tournament title in the past six postseasons.

In an in-game, in-dugout TV interview, Franklin talked about how much Corbin helped him understand the culture at the SEC’s only private school. In Franklin’s words, “Nobody knows Vanderbilt like Tim Corbin.”

That compliment is too limiting. It’s not looking good right now, but if that proposed Presidential Commission on College Athletics ever comes to fruition, Franklin should tell Nick Saban to add Corbin. He would class up the joint while adding a unique perspective on the importance of keeping the college in college sports.

Corbin, per usual, will not be at the SEC spring meetings this week because he’ll be preparing the Commodores to host an NCAA Regional. That’s good for Vanderbilt baseball, but imagine if he could make it to the beach to share a few words with his football counterparts. If any sport in the conference could benefit from the wisdom of the only current SEC baseball coach with two national championships, it’s football.

Corbin sets an example every year during the last week of May at the Hoover Met. Even though he’s lifted the biggest trophy in his sport twice at the College World Series – and has a team good enough to do it again next month – Corbin still values the SEC Tournament.

You should’ve heard the Vandy Boys celebrating their latest tournament title inside their locker room. The joyful noises carried down the hall, through the walls and into the postgame interview room.

In there, you should’ve heard Corbin, for the eleventy billionth time, express his admiration for everyone and everything that makes the SEC Baseball Tournament the best annual event on the local sporting calendar.

Every player that puts on a Vanderbilt uniform, like true freshmen Brodie Johnston, the tournament MVP, and Sunday’s starting pitcher, Austin Nye, “they know how I feel about this tournament,” Corbin said. “I have a tremendous amount of gratitude for it, to think that we’re in this conference and playing baseball at this level with people that care, people that care about watching you. There’s not a conference tournament in the country that comes close to this. So we’re fortunate. We’re fortunate people.”

We’re fortunate there are still people in college sports, in the SEC, that appreciate the moment for the moment itself.

Vanderbilt has a bigger goal ahead to get to Omaha and celebrate there, but there’s a reason the Commodores keep winning in Hoover. They’re one of only two teams in the league that’s won more than once here in the last decade – Tennessee is the other – and they’re the only program with three SEC Tournament titles since 2015.

It matters to them. It matters to them because it matters to their coach the way winning the SEC Football Championship Game mattered to Steve Spurrier. It wasn’t an end to a means. It was an end all by its own self.

There may be an SEC baseball coach or two that would rather not spend any more time in Hoover than absolutely necessary. They would prefer to rest their arms and legs as they set their sights on a bigger stage.

Corbin has a few words for them. He said playing in Hoover “sure as hell beats practicing and training back home. You know, 13,000 people, 14,000 people, you (media) folks, the TV cameras, the temperature of the weather, the temperature of the games, that helps you moving forward.”

The fourth-largest crowd in the tournament’s championship game history, announced as 13,518, showed up Sunday under partly sunny skies. We watched Vanderbilt honor the military a day before Memorial Day with its traditional olive-green Sunday uniform. We also watched the Commodores and Ole Miss honor the game by competing as if there were no more games to play. Here or anywhere.

The Rebels enjoyed a great week, beating three soon-to-be NCAA at-large teams in Florida, Arkansas and LSU to get to the finals, but as coach Mike Bianco said, “Leaving here without that trophy leaves a little bitter taste in your mouth.”

Like Corbin, Bianco has won this tournament and the College World Series. He, too, still values the SEC Tournament, and he loves his current team built around three veteran starting pitchers from Mississippi.

Remember when college sports in general and SEC sports in particular were all about home-state kids staying home and striving to win a conference championship? Vandy’s Johnston, the tournament MVP, is from Ooltewah, Tenn.

Those were the days.

You have to believe Franklin enjoyed standing in that dugout Sunday and supporting his old friend Corbin. You have to wonder if the Penn State coach felt a little nostalgia for the good old days when players often stayed in state, stayed at one school, developed their skills and developed as much of an affinity for a conference title as their head coach.

We’re lucky that feeling still exists in college baseball. It’s Franklin’s chosen sport, college football, that’s losing it.