Alabama men’s basketball was dominated by No. 1 seed Duke from start to finish 85-65 in the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament Saturday night in Newark, New Jersey, ending its bid for a national championship.
“Obviously a tough night for us,” head coach Nate Oats said. “Duke obviously had a big part to do with that. They’re a great team. They’ve got great players. Coaching staff did a good job getting them ready.”
The Blue Devils jumped all over the Crimson Tide in the first few minutes of the contest, getting out to an early 15-5 lead going into the first media timeout.
Alabama regrouped out of the break with back-to-back 3-pointers from forward Aiden Sherrell to help the team settle into the game. This led the Crimson Tide pulling within 4 points of the Blue Devils at 23-19 with 11:17 left in the half.
The tide then turned in favor of Duke when shots stopped falling for Alabama and the Blue Devils got good looks at all levels, making the score at halftime 46-37.
The Crimson Tide’s 3-point shooting was down at the half from Thursday’s win over BYU at 5/19 — less than half as many as the team had in the first half of the Sweet 16.
Guard Mark Sears had just 2 points in the half and was held scoreless from deep. There was clearly an emphasis by Duke on defending the 3-point line, especially with Sears.
“They did a good job of taking away our 3-ball,” Sears said.
Early in the second half, forward Grant Nelson came up with a huge block on star forward Cooper Flagg, followed by Sears’ first 3-pointer of the game. This made the score 50-43 with 16:17 left.
Just as Alabama pulled close, the Blue Devils went on a 7-2 run to make the lead double digits once again at 59-48 with 12:16 remaining.
The teams traded buckets for the next six minutes, and Duke had a 69-58 lead with 6:49 left in the game. Things looked bleak for the Crimson Tide, down double digits in a game where it hadn’t led for a single second.
Duke’s defensive pressure suffocated Alabama throughout the rest of the half, stretching the deficit and helping the team cruise into the Final Four, ending the Crimson Tide’s title hopes.
“Only one team is going to end up cutting the nets down in San Antonio. It won’t be us this year,” Oats said.
Duke’s effort on the defensive end down the stretch killed any momentum that the Crimson Tide attempted to build. This was evident in Alabama failing to score a point from the 8:03 mark until 2:46 in the second half.
Alabama also had no answer for the Blue Devils’ dynamic freshman duo of Flagg and guard Kon Knueppel, who scored 16 and 21 points, respectively.
Oats said that the Blue Devils’ height gave them an advantage defensively, as Duke has one of the tallest lineups in the country.
“They’ve got length all over the place,” he said.
Sears being held in check throughout the game, with just 6 points on 1/5 shooting, also played a big part of the team never being able to get back into it.
This was the last time that some players will ever play for Alabama, and Sears, a senior leaving the program, will go down as one of the team’s all-time greats.
“I’m just very thankful I got to play for coach Oats and The University of Alabama,” he said.
