ATLANTA -- Anthony Hill Jr. is one of the best players in college football. The top-ranked linebacker in the 2023 cycle, Hill was an All-American Second Team selection in 2024 and is projected to go in the top half of the 2026 NFL Draft by just about every analyst out there. At SEC Media Days, Hill was asked who, besides himself, he thought was the best defensive player in the conference. LSU's Harold Perkins, another star linebacker, was his first answer. But his next choice may have come as a surprise to some listening: Alabama defensive tackle Tim Keenan III.
Keenan is far from a revelation to anybody who has followed Alabama football over the past year. Kalen DeBoer and the coaching staff have been singing his praises regularly since the start of 2024. He fits an archetype becoming less and less common in modern SEC defenses: that of the hard-nosed, traditional nose tackle.
And Keenan, to his credit, is very good at what he does. He started 12 games for Alabama last year and was a force to be reckoned with, making life about as difficult as humanly possible for opposing offensive linemen.
"He's someone who's going to be drafted high," Auburn center Connor Lew said. "You've just got to be ready for anything. He's a guy in the SEC that I look forward to playing every year."
The stats were good but not overwhelming, with 40 tackles and 7.5 tackles for a loss, but, as is often the case with players like Keenan, they don't tell nearly the entire story. A double-team magnet, Keenan's presence was instrumental in allowing an Alabama pass rush that had lost Dallas Turner and Justin Egboigbe after 2023 to continue to dominate. Beyond Hill, he has also caught the attention of Florida star Caleb Banks, another one of the top returning interior defensive linemen in the conference.
"You look at how he can move, the first step he takes, how does he use his hands, how does he strike, how his technique is," Banks said of Keenan. "Those are the main things I've watched... he's a great player."
For as good as Keenan is on the field, he lacks the elite measurables scouts are looking for. Standing 6'2 with a modest wingspan, there are concerns about his potential being capped by his physical attributes. But if Keenan has proven one thing throughout his college career, it is that he will do whatever it takes to put himself in the best position to succeed. At the start of his career, that meant living in the gym. Keenan came to Alabama at 380 pounds and cut down to around 325 by the beginning of the 2023 season, his first as a starter.
"I'm just going to do what I can and God's going to do what I can't," Keenan said. "I can control my work ethic, I can control how hard I work, I can control what I do, but I can't control what the scouts think, so I'm going to play ball and let Him do the rest."
One thing that becomes apparent within minutes of talking to Keenan is just how grounded the fifth-year senior is in his faith. It is not simply something he talks about in interviews— it is something that is at the center of everything in Keenan's life.
"God is my why," Keenan said. "I'm always advocating for Him. He's the reason I'm in this position, I wouldn't be here without Him... God's shown me that it's possible and it's definitely a blessing."
Keenan has stated that he donates a portion of his NIL earnings to his church and spends time speaking at various churches. DeBoer called him the team's "spiritual leader" at Media Day and somebody who has the respect of the entire team.
"The team just looks at him as that big brother," DeBoer said. "He's a mentor to not just the young guys, but even the old guys. They know they can count on him to be doing the work. He embodies what a student-athlete is all about."
Keenan was selected to the watch lists for the AFCA Good Works Team and the Jason Witten Collegiate Man of the Year last season, and is very likely to earn the same recognition this year. For Keenan, his legacy is just as much about what he does off the field as it is on it.
"It's going to be a Cinderella story at the end of the day, a happy ending.," Keenan said. "That's the legacy I want to leave. Of course, a great, dominant football player, but also just a great man off the field, stuff I did in the community, and how I impacted people."