A constant theme for Nate Oats this season has been telling his team to be about the right stuff. It speaks to the "Mudita" philosophy Oats has adopted over the last few years from Alabama softball coach Patrick Murphy.
Oats has told his guys all year that if they are about the right things, success will follow.
That's exactly what happened for senior guard Latrell Wrightsell on Wednesday night in Oxford.
Oats knew he needed to get bigger in the backcourt with Bediako out, and Wrightsell stepped up and volunteered to come off the bench in favor of starting freshman forward London Jemison in the frontcourt with Aiden Sherrell and Amari Allen sliding down to the three with Labaron Philon and Aden Holloway in the backcourt.
"When we got the news that Charles wouldn’t be able to play, and we knew we were gonna have to go back to playing smaller at the four, and not having as much depth in the interior, we really couldn’t afford to play the three guards together, one, two, three," Oats said. "We were able to do that when you’ve got two seven-footers at the four and five. Now that we have more like a wing at the four, one of those guys had to come out of the starting lineup. And Wrightsell stepped up, willing to do it, like, ‘I got no problem. All I care about is winning.’
"When you're about the right stuff, good stuff happens to you."
And good things happened for Wrightsell and Alabama against Ole Miss. Shaking off Saturday's injury scare at Auburn, Wrightsell tied his career-high with seven made three-pointers on the way to a team-leading 21 points in Alabama's 93-74 win.
Latrell Wrightsell's big night sparked Alabama's offense in the win over Ole Miss
It was a sleepy, sluggish start for the Crimson Tide in Oxford. Alabama scored just 13 points in the first 12 minutes of the game. Over the final 28, the Crimson Tide dropped 80 points, including a 61-point second-half in the 19-point win.
Wrightsell was a big reason for it. He knocked down 7-of-13 from three-point range, continuing his recent three-point shooting surge. He's now 22-of-42 (52.3%) over the last five games. After shooting below 30% in non-conference play, Wrightsell is now up to 36% from three on the season.
It was only a matter of time before things clicked for him. He's too good a shooter to struggle for too long.
His recent upitck is a major development for Alabama.