Nate Oats: Alabama Basketball Let Shot-Making Dictate Effort in Loss to Kentucky
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — In a lopsided loss on Saturday night inside Coleman Coliseum, Alabama basketball fell 66-55 at the hands of No. 5 Kentucky.
Shots simply failed to fall through the basket for the Crimson Tide, which shot a collective 28-percent from the floor on the night and an abysmal 10-percent from beyond the arc. The shooting from the floor marked the worst performance by an Alabama team since 2011, when the Crimson Tide shot 26 percent against the Auburn Tigers.
Holding Kentucky to 66 points, Alabama forced plenty of opportunities to take back the game, but the poor shooting simply didn't allow the Crimson Tide to gain any ground. Alabama out-rebounded the Wildcats 47-44, with 31 of Alabama's rebounds coming from the defensive end of the court. Four blocks and five steals gave even more opportunities, but shooting — the trademark of Nate Oats-coached teams — was ultimately what held the Crimson Tide back.
Oats has reiterated all season that poor shooting shouldn't dictate a defense's effort on the opposite end. After the loss to the Wildcats, Oats repeated the same message.
“I thought [defensive effort] was good early," Oats said. "I thought our shot-making affected it as the game went on. I didn’t think we played as hard as we needed to for the entire 40. I was really disappointed in some of our guys’ effort as the game continued to go on as they missed shots.
"If you’re gonna let shot-making on offense dictate effort on defense, that’s losing basketball, and that definitely contributed to our loss tonight.”
Prior to Oats meeting with the media for his press conference, freshman center Charles Bediako stated a very similar statement to Oats — no doubt the message sent from the head coach to his players in the locker room after the loss.
"I think it was basically just effort, really," Bediako said. "Great teams find other ways to win, especially when shots aren't falling. And that's really just about it."
As any follower of Alabama basketball knows, Oats' entire coaching philosophy stems around toughness and blue-collar style of play. While there were moments that showed that effort during the Kentucky game, they grew fewer and farther between as the game progressed and as the shooting issue began to grow worse and worse.
While Alabama doesn't have another top-5 opponent coming up this week, it still has to make a road trip to play Ole Miss on Wednesday, and then follow that up by hosting Arkansas on Saturday morning. That presents two different types of threats. For the game against the Rebels, it presents the issue of playing on the road. So far this season, the Crimson Tide is 1-5 in true road games, with its one victory being an 83-70 win over Florida back on Jan. 5.
Arkansas presents a different problem. In the SEC, the Razorbacks rank in the top 5 of the conference in scoring per game, assists per game, field goal and free-throw shooting. If Alabama's defensive effort isn't there — particularly if the shots aren't falling — things could once again go south for the Crimson Tide.
In his opening statement following the Kentucky game, Oats said that his team needs to exhibit more effort, regardless of if shots are falling.
“We’ve gotta be a little bit more mentally tough, be able to handle bad shooting nights and still play hard," Oats said. "We’ve won big games this year when we didn’t shoot it well. Some of our bad losses, we did shoot it well. I thought our defense was better overall than it had been in some of our losses. It’s a good thing, otherwise we would’ve gotten blown out. But our offense really failed us tonight. We’ve gotta regroup, shoot the ball a little bit better, make sure we’re getting great shots.
"Turnovers hurt us, too. Fifteen turnovers is way too many. Some of them were just careless, guys not being locked in, and it’s a little frustrating.”
Frustrating is the right word for Alabama's string of lackluster performances dating back to prior to the new year. Since beating then-No. 3 Gonzaga and then-No. 14 Houston in back-to-back games in early December, the Crimson Tide has gone 6-8. The losses at Auburn and Kentucky last week signified the second time this season that Alabama has lost back-to-back games.
There are still eight games remaining for the regular season, and refreshing the mindset and the effort of the team starts this week at Ole Miss and against Arkansas this week. Alabama is still projected to make the NCAA Tournament, so fans can breathe a little sigh of relief in that regard.
However, if the effort continues to not be there regardless of if the shots are falling or not, things could grow from bad to worse in Tuscaloosa.
Gallery: Alabama Basketball Falls to Kentucky, 66-55
