Three Takeaways From Alabama Basketball's Tense Win Over Robert Morris

The 2-seed Crimson Tide survived the 15-seed Colonials 90-81 to advance to the NCAA Tournament Round of 32.

Alabama center Clifford Omoruyi (11) dunks the ball against Robert Morris during the first round of NCAA Men's Tournament at Rocket Arena in Cleveland, OH on Friday, Mar 21, 2025. | Photo by Crimson Tide Photos / UA Athletics

CLEVELAND –– 2-seed Alabama men's basketball survived 15-seed Robert Morris 90-81 in the Round of 64 on Friday in Cleveland.

The Colonials went toe-to-toe with the Crimson Tide for a large portion of the game and even took the lead at one point midway through the second half. However, Alabama locked in and took over late to put the game away.

There's so much to dissect from this matchup at Rocket Arena. Here are three takeaways:

Leaders to the Rescue

Alabama didn't come into this one at full strength as starting forward Grant Nelson suffered a knee injury in the SEC Tournament semifinal loss to Florida. He was listed as questionable earlier in the week and he was upgraded to a game-time decision on Thursday. Nelson was "available" just a couple of hours before the game but head coach Nate Oats said he wouldn't start and would be subbed into the game "if needed."

The Crimson Tide struggled down low defensively as Robert Morris dominated the offensive boards, which led to just a 62-58 lead for Alabama with 8:47 left in regulation. Oats decided to break the in-case-of-emergency glass and sub Nelson in.

"When he told me he was ready, I think he sensed it," Oats said on the TruTV broadcast after the game. "We can't afford to lose this. He stood up, like, 'Put me in.' We were trying to get out of that game without playing him, but it does us no good if he doesn't play and we go home."

Robert Morris took its first lead of the game a couple of minutes after Nelson first came into the game. However, immediately after this big moment, Nelson threw down a ferocious dunk and the Crimson Tide went on a run. Nelson regained the lead for Alabama with that dunk to make it 66-65 and the Tide went up 83-71 roughly four minutes later.

Nelson finished the game with five points, three rebounds (one offensive), and a steal in seven minutes of action on Friday.

Nevertheless, Nelson wasn't the only hero for Alabama in the final 20 minutes as All-American guard Mark Sears scored 19 points in the second half alone. 10 of his points came from the free-throw line and he finished the game with 10 assists and five rebounds.

16 of Alabama's final 26 points belonged to Sears. That's incredible, especially since he didn't shoot the ball much to start the game.

"Maybe in the past, he wouldn't have been as positive as he was, but I thought he was aggressive, got downhill, got to the free-throw line, drew 10 fouls in the second half," Oats said. "He ends up with 22-10-5. He didn't shoot it particularly well...I thought he competed really hard, and that's what we're looking for out of our leaders."

"[Sears and Nelson have been through it. They've been to a Final Four before. They wanted to make sure we were still playing on Sunday, and they stepped up big for us in the second half, both of them."

A Brutal Outing on the Offensive Glass

The Colonials average right around 4.5 blocks per game, which is 42nd in the country. Robert Morris is well-led in this stat category by the aforementioned Amarion Dickerson, who averages 2.4 blocks––double the runner-up. Most impressively, Dickerson who holds the No. 2 spot in the Horizon League in this stat, is just 6-foot-7.

Dickerson had two blocks against Alabama, and yet that was far from his most impressive stats. He obliterated the Crimson Tide down low with 25 points, nine rebounds (SIX offensive) and also swiped three steals. He went 1 of 8 from deep meaning he went 10-for-14 from inside the arc.

"We didn't do a very good job [against Dickerson], to be honest with you, keeping him off the glass," Oats said. "He got some downhill drives. He hit the one three. We kind of played him like a 5 and kept our 5 on, so we ended up –– he was 1-for-8 from 3. But everywhere else, I think he was like 10 of 14 from two.

"We didn't do a great job, but you've got to give him a lot of credit. That's a hard-playing, athletic guy that gave everything he had. Got two daughters here, Jocie, my middle one, she's a sweetheart, but she goes, 'Dad, I feel so bad for the other team. 3 never came out of the game. He played so hard.'

"I'm like, 'Yeah, but somebody has got to lose, and it didn't need to be us.' She felt bad he had to play the whole game, and it was nice for us he finally did foul out. He didn't have much foul trouble, and then he picked up three there late. But man, he's a hard-playing guy, so I've got a lot of respect for him."

Alabama may have outlasted Robert Morris 39-37 rebounding battle, but Dickerson, alongside forward Alvaro Folgueiras, led the Colonials to a jaw-dropping 16-5 victory on the offensive glass for 15 second-chance points. The Crimson Tide's 12.9 offensive rebounds per game is good for 34th in the nation but have failed to reach double digits in this category now four times in March.

"We have got to be better," Oats said. "I mean, I’m going through and circling everybody in the frontcourt who had zero O-boards, and I got four guys who play the 4 and the 5 for the most part who came up with zero," he said. "And then on the other end, shoot, we’ve got to box out— hit somebody when a shot goes up and go get it.

"This is something we’ve been stressing and we’re more than capable of… These guys got to step up every game because if we continue to let this happen, we won't be playing for too much longer.”

No Threes, No Problem

The Crimson Tide seems to attack the paint more and more every game this season and is forgoing their past college basketball fan-made motto of "live and die by the three" from previous years. This was very evident on Friday.

Alabama shot 6 of 21 from deep (29 percent). When it realized that this was not an efficient scoring method against Robert Morris they heavily went to the interior. The Crimson Tide scored 56 of its 90 points in the paint.

Alabama center Clifford Omoruyi scored the game's first points with an alley-oop action worked to perfection. He didn't slow down from there as he ended the game with a season-high 17 points on 8-for-8 from the field to go along with four rebounds, three steals and two blocks. Omoruyi earned the season-high very early into the second half but only played seven of the final 20 minutes despite not being in foul trouble.

Although he wasn't the starter, forward Mouhamed Dioubate essentially filled Nelson's role prior to him subbing in as he finished with 18 points, 10 rebounds, a steal and a block. The sophomore, who is by far the team leader in Hard Hats this season, earned the award once again after earning the most blue-collar points.

Alabama forward Derrion Reid has been hamstrung by injury problems throughout league play, appearing in just four games after the month of January. However, Friday seemed like the first time the freshman was finally back to full health as he finished with nine points and four rebounds in just 10 minutes. Reid is most known for athleticism and defense and he showcased both against the Colonials.

"I thought our frontcourt did a good job converting off the 25 assists, [which is a] program record for the NCAA Tournament," Oats said. "I felt like our pick-and-roll offense could kind of get the roller behind their ball screen defense. I thought we did a good job of that early. We probably should have gone, stayed in it more."

Alabama guard Labaron Philon was a big part of the record-breaking afternoon, as although he only attempted one field goal, he dished eight assists with zero turnovers. He did a solid job defensively as well as he among numerous others had the task of locking down Colonials guard Kam Woods.

Woods is a Bessemer, Alabama native who leads Robert Morris in points per game with 15.0. He was also a member of the All-Horizon League Second Team and was the conference tournament Championship MVP. Woods had eight rebounds, seven assists, two blocks, two steals and two turnovers. That said, he scored just eight points on 3 of 18 (16.6 percent) attempts from the field.

"Just try to make him go to his right," Philon said. "He's Robert Morris' best driver, that's what we saw in the scouting report. I just tried to execute that and make it tough on him to go outside and lock in."

Woods went 2 of 7 from deep, which was somewhat of a microcosm of the Colonials struggles from downtown as they shot 7-for-27.