Friday afternoon, the Alabama men’s basketball team will be playing its first meaningful postseason game since 2006. The road ahead is difficult, to say the least. In the opening round, Alabama will face a team that can score like no other, Creighton, only to have a win rewarded with a game against No. 1 seed  North Carolina.

That being said, I think the Crimson Tide will come away with one March Madness win before eventually falling in the path of destruction North Carolina will leave behind it.

Creighton forward Doug McDermott is always a major threat, and he has the talent and record of production behind him to make me think he could single-handedly beatAlabama.

That being said, I’m more inclined to think the dominance McDermott exerted on the Missouri Valley Conference is a product of the weaker teams in that conference, such as Evansville and Drake, who don’t have the talent on their rosters to simulate a player like McDermott in practice.

If the players go into a game against a talent like McDermott completely blind, it will result in a loss every single time.

This is a problem thatAlabamawill not have thanks to senior forward JaMychal Green and freshman forward Nick Jacobs. Green and Jacobs both contain the raw talent to perform the post moves that McDermott does just as well as he does.

So, Green, Jacobs, sophomore center Moussa Gueye and sophomore center Carl Engstrom should come into the game completely prepared to defend everything McDermott throws at them, having already seen it all dozens of times in practice.

Stopping McDermott is the formula for beating Creighton, asWichitaStateproved on Fe. 9 th. The Shockers held McDermott to 13 points and six rebounds, leading to a 89-68 blowout of Creighton on Creighton’s home floor.

For that reason, I am predicting a Round of 64 win forAlabama, final score of 65-58.

Assuming a Round of 64 win over the Blue Jays, there are some members of the fanbase that are holding out hope for an upset over the No. 1 seed North Carolina Tar Heels in the next round because the Tide did such a great job of battling with Georgetown, now a 3-seed, early in the season.

I don’t buy that for two reasons. One, a tournament matchup withNorth Carolinawould realistically be a road game. Remember, this hypothetical game would take place inGreensboro,N.C., just like the Creighton game did.

Alabamawould go from having home-court advantage (a sold-out Coleman Coliseum) to being surrounded by a volatile crowd in a building that holds more than 8,000 more people than Coleman Coliseum does.

Then comes the talent question. I thinkNorth CarolinaandGeorgetownare so even in overall talent level that it is difficult to differentiate one definitively above the other. However, it is clear thatNorth Carolinaknows how to use its talent better thanGeorgetowndoes.

Georgetown runs the Princeton offense, an offense that revolves around unusual cuts and innovative movement patterns to confuse a defense, therefore hiding any talent gap the offense has in comparison to the defense. In short,Georgetownruns an offense that was made for less talented teams.

North Carolinahead coach Roy Williams knows he has one of the most talented teams in the country and does not inhibit them in a certain offensive set. The stats show this, asNorth Carolina’s three top scorers average 17.4, 16.5 and 13.8 points per game, compared toGeorgetown’s highest scorer averaging 13.9.

Since it was all Alabama could do to have a chance to win at the end of the game at home against a team that limits its own offensive potential, I have trouble seeing the realistic chance of Alabama beating a similar opponent in a hostile environment against a team that lets its offensive firepower produce at its full capabilities.

But, if I’m right, I would still consider the season a success.

Alabamacame into the year a very young team, having only two upperclassmen set in the starting rotation. When you take into account that the junior, Tony Mitchell, was kicked off the team for the remainder of the season and the senior, JaMychal Green, missed seven games due t injuries and suspension, a Round of 32 appearance is very successful.

That success is amplified when realizing the Tide had to count on freshman guards Trevor Lacey, Levi Randolph and Rodney Cooper much more than it had hoped to. More importantly, this young team gets to experience the NCAA tournament and will thus be more prepared to make a deeper run when next March comes around.

So, to substitute myself as a member of the fanbase, I would be ok with bowing out before the Sweet 16 this year, knowing that all of the abstract qualities necessary for consistent winning that were gained this season puts Elite Eight potential in this team for years to come.