March Madness is here and Alabama unfortunately lost most of its late-season momentum by dropping two of its final three games, including a disappointing effort in the SEC Tournament quarterfinals that saw the Crimson Tide suffer its single worst loss of the season to Ole Miss.
Alabama's NCAA Tournament path won't be easy, and if Nate Oats hopes to lead the Tide to the Sweet 16 for the fourth consecutive season, he'll need a key player to break out of a late-season slump.
Freshman star Amari Allen has run smack into the freshman wall over the last four games leading into the Big Dance, and his recent struggles have exacerbated Alabama's offense being a bit out of synch the last few games.
Amari Allen's last four games:
6.5 PPG, 4.8 RPG, 1.3 APG, 35/7.7/25 shooting splits
Compare that to his season averages of:
11.7 PPG, 7.1 RPG, 3.1 APG 46/37/74 shooting splits
And during those last four games, Allen dropped 16 points on 8-of-12 shooting against Auburn in the regular-season finale. Drop that game, and the three games around it against Tennessee, Georgia, and Ole Miss are arguably his three worst games of the entire season, and he's unfortunately stacked them on top of one another.
Amari Allen's late season slump has been devastating for Alabama basketball
Allen's slump came directly after one of his best performances of the season. He connected on 6-of-7 attempts from three and scored 23 points in Alabama's blowout win over Mississippi State without Labaron Philon on 2/25.
Since that game, Allen is just 1-of-13 from three and scored five points or less in three of Alabama's last four games.
Alabama's backcourt of Philon, Aden Holloway, and Latrell Wrightsell is elite, but Allen is one of the Tide's most important players, and they won't go far in the NCAA Tournament unless the freshman can snap out of this recent funk.
Allen has been a projected first-round pick in the NBA Draft, and his all-around game has filled a lot of gaps for a flawed Crimson Tide roster. Along with scoring nearly 12 points per night, Allen is Alabama's leading rebounder and is third on the team in assists behind Philon and Holloway. He's also a versatile defender capable of guarding multiple positions.
One of the biggest issues is that Allen's offensive funk has impacted everything else he does on the court. The one positive is that against Ole Miss in the SEC Tournament, despite scoring just five points on 2-of-8 shooting from the floor, Allen still managed to corral 11 rebounds.
Oats has said it repeatedly about Allen and numerous other Alabama players this year: if you do the little things right and play with consistent effort, everything else will come. Allen needs to focus on the blue-collar aspects of the game starting on Friday against Hofstra, and the shots will eventually start to fall again.
Alabama's NCAA Tournament hopes might depend on it.