Cecil “Hootie” Ingram, a former Alabama football star and athletic director, died Monday. He was 90.
Ingram, who had been injured in a fall in March, died at a Birmingham hospital, an athletic department spokeswoman said, citing information from the family.
He was an All-Southeastern Conference defensive back who led the nation with 10 interceptions as a sophomore in 1952, a school and league single-season record that still stands.
“We will miss Hootie dearly,” Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne said in a post on X, formerly Twitter. “He was such a wonderful man and always greeted you with a big smile. Hootie left a lasting impact on The University of Alabama as both a student-athlete and administrator. Our condolences go out to his family and friends.”
Ingram, a Tuscaloosa native who also played halfback, played alongside quarterback Bart Starr and was also an All-SEC second baseman.
He signed with the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles but left and began a coaching career at Tuscaloosa-area high schools. Ingram spent three seasons as head coach at Clemson, going 12-21 from 1970-72 after stints as an assistant at Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, Georgia, and Arkansas.
Ingram then went into administrative roles. He was associate commissioner of the SEC, where he worked from 1972-81. Ingram went on to become athletic director at Florida State (1981-89) before returning to run his alma mater’s athletic department until his retirement in 1995.
He hired Gene Stallings as head football coach, and Stallings led the Crimson Tide to the 1992 national championship.
Ingram was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 1991 and was selected as a second-team defensive back on Alabama’s “Team of the Century.” In 2007, he won the National Alumni Association’s Paul W. Bryant Alumni-Athlete Award, recognizing athletes whose accomplishments since leaving the university are “outstanding based on character, contributions to society, professional achievement and service.”