Alabama Basketball: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly from Week One
The Ugly: Defensive struggles are alarming.
Through two games the biggest red flag with this Alabama Basketball team has been the lack of defense played by the Crimson Tide. The Alabama Basketball team allowed Morehead State to score 73 points while Indiana State scored 80 points. This has been a massive concern for Nate Oats who’s said the following in each of the first two games:
"We’ve got to get a lot better on defense. Some of these guys, if they don’t figure out how to guard, they’re not going to be playing against high-major teams. Our defense was not good again. We’ve got to do a way better job on defense. We’re going to keep preaching defense, defense, defense. That’s what we’ve got."
The defensive struggles allowed Morehead State to get back into the game on Monday while the Indiana State Sycamores jumped to an early lead and made the entire game difficult for the Alabama Basketball team. It will be interesting to see if Nate Oats shortens the rotation further coming into this week to emphasize defense. This team will need to sure up some kind of defense before the Emerald Coast Classic where they’ll face some of the tougher opponents on their schedule who’ll provide a much bigger issue if the defense isn’t secure.
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Note: All Stats Via ESPN. Quotes Via 247 Sports and Sports Illustrated