TUSCALOOSA, Ala. -- Alabama director of athletics Greg Byrne said Avery Johnson jumped up and sprinted a lap around his office when he showed the basketball coach an early photo.

“I think I did two laps,” Johnson said Thursday.

Byrne, president Stuart Bell and head football coach Nick Saban introduced a 10-year, $600 million renovation plan called The Crimson Standard on Thursday, and part of those plans includes an estimated $115 million makeover of Coleman Coliseum, the home arena for the Crimson Tide men’s and women’s basketball teams, as well as its gymnastics program.

“Just really excited about it,” Johnson said.

“When I got hired here at Alabama, during the interview process, that was one of my big questions when I asked to see the home court and the home venue. And I looked at Coleman, that was one of the first questions I had. I was like, ‘Man, how old is this building?’ … During that process, there weren’t any promises made, but the thought was Coleman would be addressed at the appropriate time. And now, this is the appropriate time.

“Greg has a great vision. He’s had great leadership. Obviously, this is subject to board approval and Dr. Bell, but we feel we have a really good model in place to get us in the end zone and make this reality. And I’m fired up. I’m fired up about what it’s going to look like, what it’s going to do for recruiting, what it’s going to do for fan experience.”

Renderings of renovations planned for Coleman Coliseum.

As part of Phase 2, Coleman will receive an extensive renovation and modernization. The renovation will maintain the same look since 1968 while completely transforming the interior of the building to include the seating bowl being entirely renovated, bringing every fan closer to the action and reducing capacity roughly 4,000 seats from 15,316 to 9,500 to 10,000 seats.

Byrne said the first row of seats will be seven feet away from the court instead of its current 17 feet, and the student section will stretch from baseline to baseline after the construction.

The new bowl will offer a variety of seating options and amenities that were never possible before in the existing structure. When completed, seats in the bowl will move as much as 35 feet closer to the court compared to their present location, providing sightlines that are among the most intimate in the country. The Tide’s new premium seating will be available to include:

-- Dedicated club seats

-- Multiple lounge spaces

-- A distinctive courtside club, providing a game-day experience that will not be matched in the SEC.

-- The renovation looks to add unique club areas, social zones, and student spaces for fans.

Introducing The Crimson Standard!



For more information on how to become involved visit https://t.co/qpWAJMQBuz #RollTide #TheCrimsonStandard pic.twitter.com/yTEwVd1qtW — Alabama Athletics (@UA_Athletics) August 16, 2018

“The top of the arena’s going to be dramatically closer to the center court than what we currently are,” Byrne said. “It will be a much more intimate, much better experience for our fans.

“Probably since the day I got here, I’ve been asked by a lot of people, ‘We’ve got to build a new arena, we've got to build a new arena.’ And it just did not make sense once we studied it, and we spent a lot of time and effort as you could tell today putting this together and working to see what our options were. We absolutely feel that renovating Coleman is the right thing to do for the long-term, for the next 30-40 years.”

New lighting features will also be noticeable after The Crimson Standard’s renovations, from video boards to ribbon boards to technology, Byrne said. One of the concepts is working with lights on the roof of the arena instead of the floor, like a lot of teams do these days.

Beyond fan amenities, the athletes who compete in Coleman will also benefit. New women’s basketball and gymnastics team locker rooms will be built on the south side of the arena along with new men’s and women’s basketball offices. A new loading dock and kitchen will also be built on the east side to allow better functionality and fan offerings throughout the arena.

The target date for the renovation is tentatively set for after the 2021-22 season.

“We have to try to, at some point, take some pressure off football where they don’t have to do everything,” Johnson said, “and men’s and women’s basketball, I think, is really our next level of growth and has great growth potential here, especially with a newly-renovated Coleman Coliseum.”

Contact Charlie Potter by 247Sports' personal messaging or on Twitter (@Charlie_Potter).

*** Don't miss a VIP update with our FREE trial of BamaOnLine. Sign up HERE ***