Why Nate Oats Referenced Nick Saban to His Team Following Ole Miss Loss

TUSCALOOSA, Ala.— Comparing college football and college basketball is like comparing apples and oranges. The two sports have completely different roster sizes, length of season, number of games and postseason formats.

But Alabama basketball head coach Nate Oats was still able to point to the results from legendary Alabama football head coach Nick Saban when trying to teach and direct his team this week after a "disgusting" home loss to Ole Miss on Tuesday.

"I kind of referenced, we've got the luxury of watching maybe the greatest that's ever done it here in Coach Saban," Oats said on Friday ahead of the Crimson Tide's game at Kentucky. "And usually his championship teams lost one early or whether it's September, October, and he got them pretty focused, and they didn’t lose much after that.

“That was the first loss in conference we had. We’d had some losses earlier. One of those was a road loss at Purdue, and the other one Trelly (Latrell Wrightsell Jr.) went out, so maybe it’s the first time we’ve lost with the group of guys that’s going to finish the year out— minus Derrion obviously."

The loss to Ole Miss was No. 4 Alabama's (14-3, 3-1 SEC) first loss since the championship game of the Players Era Festival in Las Vegas on Nov. 30, snapping an eight-game win streak. Freshman forward Derrion Reid was unable to go against the Rebels and is questionable for Saturday's game at Kentucky. But outside of Reid, who is expected to return this season, the squad that the Crimson Tide played with Tuesday night will be the core group moving forward for the rest of the season and into March Madness.

Oats said he hoped that a veteran-laden team with four fifth-year players wouldn't have needed a wakeup call like that early in SEC play, but that it can be a good thing for a team.

"I think it did give us a wakeup call," Oats said. "We maybe overlooked Ole Miss a little bit, which I don’t know how that’s possible. They were 3-0, and they’ve beaten good teams. Maybe just the history of some of the guys that have been here. We haven’t lost to Ole Miss since I’ve been here till that. So I don’t know if they thought that’s why. I just told them, if you overlook anybody in this league, you’re going to take an L. It looked like on our offensive end, we weren’t ready to play basketball. Like the turnovers, we didn’t come ready to go on Tuesday."

He expects to see a different team on Saturday after having conversations with the older leaders on the team like Mark Sears, Grant Nelson, Clifford Omoruyi and Chris Youngblood throughout the week. Oats said outside of Youngblood, the other three veterans are naturally more quiet guys, but he wants them to be more vocal moving forward.

"We didn't have an intensity and a focus that a game in the SEC demands, and that's on me to make sure that it happens," Oats said. "I told them, like, on my end, I'll make dang sure that if I've got anything to do with it, it's not gonna happen again."

It will quite literally be an early wakeup call for the Crimson Tide on Saturday when the team travels to Rupp Arena to take on No. 8 Kentucky (14-3, 3-1 SEC) with an 11 a.m. CT tip time. There will be no overlooking a team like Kentucky in a place like Rupp Arena as Alabama looks to regroup and remain near the top of the SEC standings.

Team	Conference Record	Games Back	Overall Record
Auburn	4-0	-	16-1
Ole Miss	4-0	-	15-2
Tennessee	3-1	1	16-1
Alabama	3-1	1	14-3
Kentucky	3-1	1	14-3
Missouri	3-1	1	14-3
Florida	2-2	2	15-2
Mississippi State	2-2	2	14-3
Georgia	2-2	2	14-3
Vanderbilt	2-2	2	14-3
Texas A&M	2-2	2	14-3
LSU	1-3	3	12-5
Texas	1-3	3	12-5
Oklahoma	0-4	4	13-4
Arkansas	0-4	4	11-6
South Carolina	0-4	4	10-7

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