No. 5 Alabama Basketball Has Some Issues to Work on Heading into SEC Play

TUSCALOOSA, Ala., -- The Alabama basketball team played its final game of the year, taking a 105-82 win against South Dakota State, to complete its non-conference schedule with a 11-2 record.

The 11 non-conference wins is the most under head coach Nate Oats and the most since the 2011-12 season.

What have we learned about the No. 5 Alabama squad as it heads into 2025 and the Southeastern Conference portion of the schedule?

"There’s a lot that we need to be better at and lot that we need to clean up to compete and win a championship in this league,” Oats said. “We tested ourselves against some of the better teams in the country and we know when we are playing our best, we can play with anybody in the country.”

Wins against North Carolina, Houston and Illinois were important, but so were the losses to Purdue and Oregon. The Crimson Tide figured out during this non-conference schedule what issues need to be addressed before tackling a brutal SEC slate.

The big issue is 3-point shooting and the consistency. Latrell Wrightsell Jr., one of the top shooters, is out for the year with an ACL injury, and Chris Youngblood has slowly worked his way back from a preseason injury.

"We have to find different ways to score when we are not shooting well from 3-point range,” Oats said. “Today we made 18, but we shot 35%, which is not that great.”

That issue could be resolved with Aden Holloway, the transfer from Auburn. Oats said Holloway has been a nice surprise so far this season. He blistered the nets Sunday with eight 3-pointers and led the offense with 26 points. He took 19 shots from 3-point range, and Oats wants him to shoot more.

“It’s crazy because he gets mad when I don’t shoot,” Holloway said. “He has a lot of confidence in me and let’s me play my game.”

The play of Labaron Philon has been a pleasant surprise for Oats. The freshman has jumped into the starting lineup in 11 of 13 games and has been as good as advertised. He hit for 21 points Sunday with six assists in 27 minutes.

Youngblood is still trying to find his footing. He was 1 of 7 from the floor against South Dakota State. Has played just four games.

Defense is always in the back of Oats’ mind. It’s one of the core components to his teams, like 2019-21 when SEC Defensive Player of the Year Herb Jones was on the floor. On Sunday, Alabama gave up 49 second-half points and let the Jackrabbits hang around longer than they should have.

Shutting down big men in the middle is also issue. Oscar Cluff, South Dakota State’s top player, had his ninth double-double, hitting for 21 points with 15 rebounds. Bama's big-man trio of Clifford Omoruyi, Aiden Sherrell and Grant Nelson had difficulty keeping Cluff off the boards and limiting his scoring in the paint.

“We’ve seen a lot of different styles. We’ve learned a lot,” Oats said. “Our post defense got exposed a little bit, particularly starting with the Purdue game,” Oats said. “We’ve got to be better with that and we’ve got to keep working on it.”