Alabama basketball coach Nate Oats met with his team Thursday and didn’t leave room for interpretation.
The message, fresh off an abysmal home loss to Ole Miss: Alabama men’s basketball would go into Rupp Arena and get the victory over Kentucky. By any means necessary. Oats even gave an ultimatum of sorts.
Got it?
The Crimson Tide players seemed to. No. 4 Alabama went into Lexington, Kentucky and beat the No. 8 Wildcats 102-97 on Saturday.
“We came in with the right mindset,” Oats said postgame. “Guys made sure we got a win. Whatever it took.”
Rebounding. Attacking downhill. Draining triples. Drawing fouls. Making free throws. Alabama had to fight until the final minute. Effort that wasn’t there in the 74-64 loss to Ole Miss on Tuesday showed up against Kentucky (14-4, 3-2 SEC) on Saturday.
“This was a completely different team than the one that played Ole Miss,” Oats said. “If we learned the lessons we needed to in that loss Tuesday and we don’t forget them the remainder of the year, it may have been the best thing to happen to us.”
Alabama (15-3, 4-1) responded to one of its worst offensive performances in recent memory with two good days of practice Thursday and Friday, Oats said before making the trip to Lexington. The older players also took ownership of the struggles against Ole Miss. They acknowledged they didn’t have the team ready to go.
Take Grant Nelson for example. In the loss to Ole Miss, he tallied nine points, eight rebounds and five turnovers while he went 3 of 7 from the free-throw line.
Against Kentucky, he tallied 25 points, 11 rebounds, and four turnovers while going 9 of 10 from the free-throw line.
Nelson had 10 points not even five minutes into the Kentucky game.
“Grant Nelson came out ready to go,” Oats said.
That was no mistake. After the Ole Miss game, Nelson got in the gym and worked. Oats said Alabama made small corrections to Nelson’s shot. The Crimson Tide also got some confidence in him because of all the work Nelson put in Thursday and Friday.
Nelson wasn’t the only one who logged some hours in the gym. Labaron Philon was also among that group, Oats said. “He’s been in the gym a ton.”
Philon went from an 0-for-8 performance with one point off free throws against Ole Miss to a 4-for-10 outing, making three triples on five attempts, for a 15-point day against Kentucky.
“It’s not rocket science,” Oats said. “You spend time in the gym, you make shots. You spend time in the gym, you make your free throws.”
Free throws made the difference down the stretch. Alabama, who had shot only 69.7% from the charity stripe heading into the game, made 12 of its last 13 over the final 2:03 on a day it shot 85% overall in that category.
Mark Sears went 8-for-9 from the free-throw line in a game in which he scored 24 points. Philon made all four attempts. Clifford Omoruyi went 2-for-2, as did Chris Youngblood.
Mo Dioubate had the worst free-throw shooting percentage on the day as he went 4-for-7, but he more than made up for it in other areas. In 15 minutes of play, he scored eight points, grabbed eight boards, tallied three assists and secured one steal. Dioubate won the hard-hat award for his efforts.
