Alabama basketball advanced to the Sweet 16 for the third consecutive season following an 80-66 win over Saint Mary's on Sunday night.
It was a collective scoring effort from the Crimson Tide with six players scoring in double-figures and Alabama's leading scorer - Chris Youngblood - scoring just 13 points. Nate Oats continues to elevate this program to new heights and has Alabama just two wins away from a second consecutive Final Four.
The Sweet 16 had been a glass ceiling for this program historically until Alabama busted through it last year with a win over North Carolina. It was just the second Sweet 16 win in program history. On Thursday, Alabama will hope to make it a third.
Alabama will face off against BYU on Thursday in Newark with tipoff being announced for 6:09 PM CT on CBS. The Tide and Cougars will be leading off the Sweet 16 on Thursday night
CBS Sports and TNT Sports Announce Tip Times and Commentator Teams for Regional Semifinals on Thursday, March 27, and Friday, March 28 pic.twitter.com/7Um6VyXxYk
— March Madness Men’s Basketball TV (@MM_MBB_TV) March 24, 2025
BYU was the East Region's 6-seed and enters the Sweet 16 with a 26-9 overall record. To get here, the Cougars beat a talented 11-seeded VCU in the First Round and then held on to upset 3-seeded Wisconsin 91-89 in the Second Round.
BYU is one of the hottest teams in the country having won 11 of their last 12 games with the one loss coming to Houston in the Big 12 Conference Tournament.
They will be a handful to deal with and will be a significant change of pace from Alabama's first two NCAA Tournament matchups. The Cougars are much more offensively focused and are one of the nation's top shooting teams. They connect on a 37.3% clip from three-point range and are 6th in the country in effective field goal percentage, per KenPom.
It'll be a quick turnaround for Alabama following Sunday night's game against Saint Mary's. Alabama will only have three days between games and will theoretically travel back to Tuscaloosa from Cleveland before flying out to Newark. It's possible Oats decides to keep the team on the road, similarly to how he did earlier in the season for a Saturday-Tuesday road trip to Arkansas and Texas in back-to-back games.