Alabama coach fires back at Coach K

Alabama coach Nate Oats came out with a strong statement opposing Mike Krzyzewski on Thursday.

The Duke coach said after Tuesday’s game that he thought the NCAA should “reassess things” … implying that college basketball shouldn’t be going on while COVID cases are increasing around the nation.

Oats was asked about Krzyzewski’s comments by a reporter at a press conference.

“That’s a good question,” He said. “Can I ask you something? I just want to know your opinion. Do you think if Coach K hadn’t lost the two non-conference games at home he’d still be saying that?”

The reporter answered, “Probably not.”

“I just wanted you to say it,” he said. “Not me.”

Oats then continued.

“Here’s my deal on it: I think we have a whole lot more problems if we weren’t playing games. Like, I mean, everybody talks about COVID … here’s the other thing. If COVID is so bad, all these coaches … look, I’m trying to do my best to keep the mask up. I’ve already had COVID so I don’t even … I technically… I shouldn’t have to keep it on. Nobody can get it from me. I’m still within 150 days that the NCAA recommended. I see all these other guys that haven’t had it with their masks down the whole game. It’s like they got a chinstrap on. So if they’re really worried about COVID, you’d think their mask would be up the whole game, right? So I think some of them are using … no, we should be playing, in my opinion. We should 100 percent be playing basketball. Nobody talks about the mental … there’s a kid out of Detroit that went to another high major. I just talked to his uncle, because his cousin played for me in Detroit. He went to a high-major school somewhere, had a mental health issue and came home, because he was quarantined for weeks on end when he got there. Like what are these guys going to do? I’ve got three daughters. They need to be in school. Humans aren’t made to sit alone in isolation for weeks and weeks on end. We’ve got to be careful with how we do life, but we’ve still got to do life. Part of life—a huge part of life for all these guys I’m coaching—is being in the gym playing basketball. I think their mental health is in a much better spot playing basketball. I think the school, the SEC and the NCAA have done a really good job not putting any of them in danger. So no, I don’t agree with them at all. I … you answered the question for me. So, thanks.”