Crimson tidings from . . . Bridgeport?

A quirky Bridgeport tradition more than three decades old has moved south to Dixie this winter.

As Montgomery County drivers learned in 1979, 1980, and 1993, the bylaws of the borough's geographically isolated University of Alabama Booster Club require the raising of billboards in public praise any time the school wins a national football title.

But don't waste gas motoring along Route 23 to look for the latest sign heralding, from 950 miles away, the Crimson Tide's 37-21 victory over Texas on Jan. 7.

For the first time, the club spent its money on a sign that perhaps none of its members will see in person: on Route 82 in Tuscaloosa, Ala., a few Greg McElroy passes from campus.

"I probably owe it more to those fans down there," club president Johnny Nicola said. "That university has been really great with us fans from the booster club."

Until next Sunday, the weathered borough's name will shine over West Alabama from an incandescent, four-panel digital billboard above one of Tuscaloosa's main drags.

The Bridgeport club spent $3,000 for a month of space, said Brian Fikes, an Alabama sales manager for the billboard's owner, Lamar Advertising. Up until the game, it wished the Tide luck; now its panels include a bit of poetry ("You took the Longhorns for a ride/With every bit of Crimson Pride") and congratulatory messages for coach Nick Saban and the team.

Nicola and eight other club members heard plenty about the billboard from traveling Alabamians they met on a trip to California to watch the Alabama-Texas game. But they did not hear quite the derisive tone they did after erecting the billboard in Bridgeport in 1979, shortly after Alabama's Sugar Bowl win over Penn State.

"I took a lot of smack over that one," Nicola said.

It was discussed, he said, "like we put salt in the wounds of the Penn State fans around here. There was nothing demeaning to it, but people didn't take to it."