How Many Wins Can Alabama Basketball Earn in Second Gauntlet of Season? Just a Minute

The Crimson Tide has 11 SEC games remaining in the regular season and eight of its contests are currently scheduled to be top-25 matchups.

Jan 25, 2025; Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA; Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Nate Oats disputes a call during the second half against the LSU Tigers at Coleman Coliseum. Mandatory Credit: Will McLelland-Imagn Images | Will McLelland-Imagn Images

Welcome to BamaCentral’s "Just a Minute," a video series featuring BamaCentral's Alabama beat writers. Multiple times a week, the writers will group up to provide their take on a topic concerning the Crimson Tide or the landscape of college sports.

Watch the above video as BamaCentral staff writer Hunter De Siver and Will Miller discuss the extreme difficulty of Alabama men's basketball's final 11 games.

Earlier in the season, Alabama men's basketball had a gauntlet of a 7-game non-conference slate on the schedule as the Crimson Tide went 5-2 during a stretch against four ranked teams that featured two road games, four neutral-site and one home game.

It's impossible at this point in the season to name any other conference in college basketball that's been better than the SEC. Four of No. 4 Alabama's first seven conference opponents have been and still are ranked. The Crimson Tide has 11 SEC games remaining in the regular season and eight of its contests are currently scheduled to be top-25 matchups.

This is Alabama's second gauntlet of the season:

• Jan. 29: at No. 14 Mississippi State
• Feb. 1: vs. Georgia
• Feb. 8: at Arkansas
• Feb. 11: at Texas
• Feb. 15: vs. No. 1 Auburn
• Feb. 19: at No. 20 Missouri
• Feb. 22: vs. No. 12 Kentucky
• Feb. 25: vs. No. 14 Mississippi State
• March 1: at No. 8 Tennessee
• March 5: vs. No. 5 Florida
• March 8: at. No. 1 Auburn

If the season ended today, Alabama's No. 4 spot in the AP Poll would give the Tide one of the No. 1 seeds in the bracket. ESPN's Joe Lunardi actually has Alabama at No. 3 overall and placed it as the top seed in the Midwest region on Tuesday.

The question now is if the Crimson Tide can retain that status throughout the upcoming gauntlet. The number of wins can't fully determine whether or not this will be the case, as a couple of other teams outside of the conference are also in the running for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

But for now, BamaCentral's Hunter De Siver predicts Alabama will go 8-3 in the stretch with losses to Kentucky at home and Tennessee and Auburn on the road. This would bring Alabama's final 2024-25 regular season record to 25-6.

BamaCentral's Will Miller predicts the Crimson Tide will also finish 8-3 in the second gauntlet, bringing Alabama's final regular season record to 25-6. However, his losing predictions are slightly different as he believes the Tide will be swept by Auburn and fall to Tennessee. Additionally, Miller agreed with De Siver that the Kentucky game may not go in Alabama's favor and suggested that the same outcome could occur against Florida.

Read More: Why It Will Be 'Ridiculously Hard' for Alabama Basketball to Defeat Mississippi State

How to Watch: No. 4 Alabama Basketball at No. 14 Mississippi State

Alabama Basketball vs. Mississippi State Official Injury Report