Alabama’s PA announcer, Tony Giles, summed up the loss perfectly during his sign off to the sparse crowd remaining in Coleman Coliseum after the buzzer sounded.

“This is Alabama basketball.”

In a near repeat performance in its Texas A&M loss just two weeks ago, Alabama allowed Vanderbilt to unleash a plethora of 3-pointers in the 87-79 loss. It was the Commodores first road SEC win in exactly two years.

Against Texas A&M, Alabama allowed the Aggies — then-ranked 351^st in 3-point percentage — to shoot 11 of 24 (46%), which resulted in a 74-68 loss for the Crimson Tide.

Ranked 178^th in the country by shooting 33.1% from beyond the arc, Vanderbilt shot 15 of 28 (53.5%) from the 3-point line, including 9 of 14 in the second half.

“This is a team that went 0-25 [in the SEC] at one point, but they are also more of capable of making shots. I told our guys that [before the game],” coach Nate Oats said.

Entering halftime with a 42-35 deficit, Alabama tried to make adjustments to correct ball-screen defense after Vanderbilt shot 6 of 14 from beyond the arc.

But the Commodores did not allow the adjustments to affect them. After Vanderbilt made two 3-pointers to open the second half, Oats used his first of three timeouts remaining just 1:10 into the half.

The Crimson Tide defense did not improve after the timeout, as the Commodores made its next two shots to extend the lead to 10 points, their largest of the night.

“We have tried different things,” Oats said. “… In order to switch [on a ball screen], you have to have athletic bigs that can stay in front of a guard and you have to have big, strong guards that can keep the ball out of the post. We don’t have either of those, to be honest, at times.”

Despite allowing the Commodores to make its first four threes in the second half, Alabama started to defend the 3-point line better. The Commodores shot just 2 of 7 between the 17-minute mark and the four-minute mark.

However, Commodore guard Saben Lee scored 15 of Vanderbilt’s final 17 points in the final four minutes, including three 3-pointers to push the game from a one-possession game to a two-possession game on all three occasions.

Lee ended with 38 points on 14-of-20 shooting from the field and 6-of-7 from beyond the arc.

“You look at Saben Lee and the couple of threes he hit late in the game, we tried to switch and tell our bigs to get up in the ball and force them to drive and get a little help,” Oats said. “But it didn’t happen. We kinda got the switch [on the screen] and our big backed up and he made the three.”

Alabama will travel to Missouri on Saturday with tip off set for 1:30 P.M. The Crimson Tide defeated the Tigers in its first matchup 88-74 in Coleman Coliseum.