Alabama Basketball: Five Reasons Tide Postseason Is NIT And Not NCAA
By Ronald Evans
The Jimmy’s and the Joe’s
Avery Johnson has proven quickly he can recruit top talent to Alabama. You can look at details of next season’s six new players below:
Next: Help on the Way for 2017-18
This season Johnson and his coaching staff mixed and matched, shuffled and suspended to the best possible combinations. While this was an evolving process, very late in the season the best mix was clear.
No disrespect is intended to any player for the observations that follow. This Alabama basketball team may not have always played smart but they always played hard.
Some victories can be best described as scratch and claw your way to the top games. The most recent loss to Kentucky showed an overmatched Tide team, unbowed and certainly unafraid to take on any comer.
On effort alone, the 2016-17 Alabama basketball team is an easy one to love.
The roster problem resulted from recruiting misses for too many previous seasons. This year’s team was fortunate to be led by two talented freshmen, Braxton Key and Dazon Ingram. Capable support was provided by others, most notably Riley Norris, Dont’a Hall and Bola Olaniyan.
Despite these player resources, the roster was a band-aid, incomplete and inadequate at key positions.
For all his strengths, Dazon Ingram is not a point guard. Without the defense of a true point guard, it is difficult to stop dribble penetration by the opponent. No one on the squad was an effective, consistent go-to inside scorer. The perimiter game works better with an inside scoring threat.
It is fair to not hope, but expect this time next year, no such assessment can be made about the 2017-18 roster. Avery Johnson has done a superb job with this team.
Next season this time, we’ll all be ‘Dancin.’