In a rivalry showdown that featured the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country, Alabama ultimately fell short, losing 94-85 against Auburn. Here is the good, the bad and the ugly from the loss.
The good
Solving turnover issues. When head coach Nate Oats went on College Gameday, he was asked what Alabama needs to do in order to win the national championship. His response was “less turnovers.”
Against a physical Auburn defense, the Crimson Tide did a stellar job of not turning the ball over. The team only gave the ball away seven times, the lowest number during conference play thus far.
Although the result of the game isn’t what Oats was hoping for, the low turnovers is a positive sign moving forward for a team that really needed to limit them.
The bad
Allowing too many 3-point attempts. Auburn came into the game shooting 37.5% from 3-point range during conference play, third in the SEC. The focus from the Crimson Tide defense should have been to force the Tigers inside and not allow them to get many 3-point shots up.
Instead, Auburn was able to attempt 30 three-pointers in the game and made 12 of them, good enough for 40% from downtown. Although a few of the Tigers’ makes were on good contests from the Crimson Tide defense, Oats was still upset with allowing the ball to be shot from downtown in the first place.
“We wanted to get their shooters off the line,” Oats said. “You go down the list, too many guys got 3s off that weren’t supposed to be getting easy ones off, and they go 12/30 from 3. They out-scored us by 21 points from 3, and that’s just too many with the plan that we were trying to execute on our defensive end.”
Giving up extended runs. Right away, the Tigers gave a sign of what was to come when they immediately went on a 9-0 run.
Auburn closed out the half nearly the same way it started the first, with a 7-0 run. Then, in the second half, after Alabama rallied to tie the game at 68-68, the Tigers immediately struck back with a 9-1 run, stealing the momentum that the Crimson Tide had worked hard to gain.
“We talk about starts and closes to halves a lot, and we did an awful job, and they did a great job,” Oats said.
The ugly
Big-time struggles from downtown. One of the biggest reasons why the Crimson Tide lost this game was the struggles from 3. It’s no secret that an Oats-led offense will get 3-point shots up, and the team this year has had the talent to make them, as the team shot 37% from 3-point range.
The Crimson Tide shot a dismal 5/26 from behind the arc, converting at a poor 19.2% rate, a season-low. Even if the team had shot a below-average 30%, winning the game would have been much easier. But instead, Alabama failed at its bread and butter and was unable to seize momentum due to hitting the rim too often on three-pointers.
“They did a great job, I thought, on their defensive end, trying to take away our 3s,” Oats said. “We didn’t shoot it very well, but they contested them.”
Best players not stepping up. In a big rivalry game between the country’s No. 1 and No. 2 teams, it’s ideal for the best players to step up and perform. But that simply didn’t happen with the Crimson Tide.
Although guard Mark Sears scored a team-high 18 points, he shot just 4/17 from the field, including 2/11 on shots from downtown. Forward Grant Nelson struggled heavily on both ends, shooting an inefficient 5/11 from the field while only making one 3-pointer and missing several shots at the rim. Nelson struggled to guard Auburn forward Johni Broome all night, and It seems his defensive communication wasn’t on point either with poor effort on screens and leaving his man at times, all leading to a team-low negative-20 plus-minus.
It felt like too much of the scoring bulk was put on the supporting players instead of the two leaders on this Alabama team.
Stagnant offense. Far too often, it felt like the Alabama offense wasn’t moving around enough and creating open shots, instead just standing and watching the ballhandler.
This led to the Crimson Tide’s season-low eight assists, the first game this season in which the team failed to eclipse double-digits. Going forward, in big matchups like these, the team needs to do a better job helping out the primary ballhandler and getting open.
Alabama will hope to rebound from the loss on Wednesday against Missouri on the road at 8 p.m. CT. The game can be streamed on the SEC Network.
