Everything Nate Oats said after Alabama's 96-83 win over Kentucky

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – No. 4 Alabama defeated No. 17 Kentucky, 96-83, Saturday at Coleman Coliseum. After the Crimson Tide bounced back on its home floor, Alabama head coach Nate Oats spoke to reporters. Below is everything Oats said after the Crimson Tide’s 22nd win.

Oats’ opening statement…

“I thought our guys did a good job once we kind of dug ourselves a hole, and you got to give Kentucky a ton of credit to come out like they did, knowing that they were down bodies. And I think Coach Pope’s done a really good job galvanizing that crew and having them ready to go. I mean, you look at some guys that weren’t in the rotation earlier. Collin Chandler – shoot, he is +7 when he’s in the game tonight. I thought he played great. He hit the big 3 late. 

“Noah’s had big games. They’ve had multiple guys. Travis Perry steps up, scores double digits for them, and he wasn’t playing that heavy before. So they’ve had guys step up, play well. Carr, we kind of chose not to guard him, which we were supposed to guard him when he had the ball, just help off a little more, and he ends up burning us for three 3s. So for him to have 17 I thought was pretty good, too. So I give them a bunch of credit.

“But I thought our guys didn’t really panic. We get down 12. We just stick with it. We started getting stops. Our defensive efficiency numbers after that first four minutes, after the first 4-minute media timeout, the next 16 minutes of the first half, we held them to a 0.8, only scored 24 points on the next 30 possessions. So the defense from that point on was where we needed it to be. Now, why we’re not starting better? I gotta go look at the video again. I thought we’d have a little bit better start. We were still having turnover issues. We had 15 turnovers and only 14 assists. 

“Part of putting Labaron in the starting lineup was allowing Mark to get off the ball a little bit more, a little bit more like he’d done with Estrada last year. I thought it’s worked for Mark. He’s back-to-back 30-point games for the first time in his career, and it’s been pretty efficient, too. So I think that made sense. We just need Labaron to stop turning it over as much as he is. And I thought Holloway, pairing him a little bit more with Sears, too, letting him create a little bit. even though he didn’t have an assist, he ended up scoring 19 off the bench. I thought he’s been good. 

“Sears is playing the best basketball I’ve seen him play since he’s been here, on both sides of the ball. The one play with the bad turnover there late, trying to get Cliff a lob, which not the smartest play. He apologized as soon as he came to the bench. He felt bad. But I think he knew Cliff was one point shy of a double-double. He had played so hard, he rebounded it. He was trying to get him a bucket and then turns around gets a steal, comes back and hits the 3. I think his defensive effort has been pretty good, the best it’s been. And then I think offensively, he’s been really efficient. 

“So proud of the effort. Gotta clean up the turnovers. Gotta still clean up the defense a little bit. But it was significantly better than the Missouri game.”

Oats on the thought process of making so many substitutions early in the game…

“It was more zero tolerance for effort. And it wasn’t so much an effort thing, but I basically said there’s going to be zero tolerance for effort, scouting report screwups. that’s a bigger thing. We put the scouting report in, it needs to be followed and you need to be locked in and focused on the right thing. And then just dumb turnover. We’ve gotta stop turning the ball over. 

“So I don’t know that it worked, but that’s the way it’s gonna be moving forward. I’m tired of the guys not being locked into a scouting report. If you create our effort levels 1-10, it’s not like we’ve got anybody given four, five, six, but there’s like levels to this thing. And we can’t be given an eight or nine. We need a 10. So we’ve just got to challenge the guys. And I thought they responded well and kind of settled in there after we got down 12. And it was a little bit better after that.”

Oats on Alabama’s defense to close out the first half…

“They scored 16 in the first four minutes. So they end up with 24 over the next 16 on 30 possessions. It as a 0.8. I’m looking at the from the 16 to 12, it was a 0.57, from the eight to four, it was a 0.4, and then we closed it with a 0.86. So there was one in the middle of those that was just a little suspect. But three out of those next four kind of four-minute wars, if you will, was as good as we’ve seen. And this is a good offensive team. 

“Even with all the injuries and everything. I mean, Brea is one of the best shooters in the country. Carr is obviously really good. Amari Williams just had a triple-double not that long ago. They’re good. They got the fifth-rated offense in the country. So to do that for 16 minutes, or 12 of those 16, that was as good as we’ve seen.

“And that’s really what I want us focused on moving forward. Just get locked into the scouting report and play as hard as you can possibly play. Don’t turn the ball over on offense and let everything else fall where it goes. Making shots, missing shots. I’m not worried about it. I’m worried about the scouting report. Are you locked in mentally? Are you giving us max effort? And an eight out of 10 ain’t enough. It needs to be a 10 out of 10. And are you taking care of ball on offense? Those three things… 

“I probably need to add in offensive rebounding because I think we only got one in the second half. We need Mo Dioubate to be a little bit more locked into the scouting report stuff so we can play more because he’s a monster on the glass, and hopefully, we’ll get him tuned in for the Mississippi State one. We’re going to need a lot more in that game.

“But Cliff, the most rebounds Cliff’s had since he’s been here. He had 15 rebounds and he had the best defensive leverage on the team. We were 45 points per 100 possessions better when him on the floor on the defensive end than we were when he was off the floor. So I thought it was a great game out of the Cliff tonight.”

Oats on passing Wimp Sanderson for the most ranked wins in program history…

“Honestly, I mean, Wimp did a really good job here. I’m guessing that the SEC is a lot better now, so there’s a lot more opportunities to get top-25 wins than he probably had. And when they give you the opportunity, you take advantage of them and then try to get it done.

“We don’t have enough because we had a chance to get two more in the last two games before this, and we didn’t come up with them. But I think it does speak to the level of the SEC as a whole, that now we’ve got all these opportunities. I mean, every team we play the rest of the year is a top-25 team. So I’m guessing Wimp didn’t have that many opportunities like we have, but you also got to go win them.

“So a lot of credit to our guys we’ve had here. Herb’s in the building today, getting rehab on his shoulder. I mean, Herb got this thing going for us. And then you got Shackleford, Quinerly, Brandon Miller, Clowney. Just a lot of players that stepped up in big-time games throughout the years, and now, a lot of opportunities to get top-25 wins.

“So a combination of the two. It’s a good time for basketball in the state of Alabama.”

Oats on what has led to Mark Sears’ play of late…

“I think he just wants to win. He came back to try to win the national championship. He came back to try to play his way into the NBA. Winning solves a lot of that stuff. If you look, he’s not really forcing it, pressing it. He got stuck in the lane where, like in the past, I think he would have thrown up a bad shot. He kicks it out. I think Holloway hit a three off it, if I remember correctly. We got a good shot off the possession. 

“He’s trying to play the right way. He’s as coachable as he’s ever been. And his effort on defense has been through the roof, really, the last three, four weeks or so. So just a combination of let’s get him to lead, let’s play the right way on both sides of the ball and give us total effort on defense, and I think he’s been doing that, and I’m super happy with the way he’s been playing.”

Oats on Sears making better decisions at the rim…

“He was 5-of-7 at the rim with some shot-blockers in there. I tell the guys like, take the ones you should take and make them. If you’re getting your shot blocked, they’re probably aren’t good shots. And he got his shot blocked once tonight, but as aggressive as he is, he gets to the line 11 times, I’ll take that. We just can’t have him getting his shot blocked three or four times because he’s making the wrong reads. I thought he made a lot of really good reads. 

“Now, we need some other guys to knock some shots down, get him a few more assists, and we need to stop turning the ball over. He wasn’t so bad today, but some other guys, we got more opportunities to get assists on offense. But yeah, I mean, he’s been good. I mean, he didn’t even shoot it great from three. Three-of-8 is OK for him. But to get 30 points on 17 shot attempts is some pretty elite stuff. And then you go back, he had 35 on 20 shot attempts at Mizzou. You look at some other guys in our league that score that amount of points, they’re taking a lot more shots than what he’s taking. 

“When we inserted Labaron in the starting lineup, I just told him we need you to trust him like he did Aaron last year. I told him you’re going to score more points on fewer shots. So I think 17 is the same that he got against Auburn two games ago. His output on these 17 shots was better than it was against Auburn. So he’s scoring more points on the same amount of shots, at least the Auburn. He’s playing well. His efficiency on offense, his effort on defense. I’m looking at the defensive leverage. He had a positive defensive leverage, which that hasn’t always been the case. We were 18 points better per 100 possessions with him on the floor than when he was off on defense today, and that’s great for him.”

Oats on the reason Grant Nelson played a season-low 15 minutes…

“He was in foul trouble. He had two fouls. He was in foul trouble, and then he picked a third one early in the second half, and then he picked up a fourth one as soon as he got in after the third one. Look, I’m not a two-foul guy sit the whole half, but we were on a run. We were building a lead. And he picks up some dumb ones sometimes. Just for whatever reason. So I didn’t think there was a need to get him back in with two fouls in the first half when other guys were playing pretty well.”

Oats on Alabama’s defense on Otega Oweh…

“It was the first time he hasn’t scored in double digits the entire year. He was only player in the SEC, I believe, coming into this game that had scored in double digits every single game. Obviously, the foul trouble helped us. But even if he hadn’t fouled out, he was 1-of-9 in 22 minutes. So even if he plays 30 minutes, he only had two points. So I thought we did a pretty good job. I think we’ve got enough versatility on defense that if our guys would get locked into the scouting report and play with max effort, we should be a significantly better defensive team than what we’ve shown in the past. 

“Because you got Jarin Stevenson at 6-10 that can move, that can chase shooters, that can make shooters shoot over him. You got Dioubate that’s as strong as can be, that can move and switch and guard one through five. Youngblood is a veteran guy that’s super strong, that’s not going to get screened, can guard strong guys like Oweh. We’ve got defensive versatility that I’ve just got to do a better job. This is on me, our defense. I haven’t held them accountable enough on the defensive end. That’s why you saw eight subs in the first six minutes. So we’re going to do a better job holding them accountable on that end of the floor.”

Oats on the response from the guys after Kentucky’s start…

“I was really amped up at the beginning of the games because we needed a better start. It didn’t happen. I didn’t want to panic. I thought there was times when our defensive effort was really good. You just can’t turn the ball on offense. You put your defense at a disadvantage. So I just tried to stay calm. Alright, that’s what we need on defense. Stop turning over, we’ll get it. And they just hung in there, hung in there. 

“And look, I must say, Sears’ leadership in huddles is the best it’s ever been. His leadership on the floor. It’s great to have Chris Youngblood there, Grant. We’ve got four fifth-year guys. This is the best Cliff’s played all year. Sears is playing his best basketball of the year. Chris Youngblood, this was as good as he’s played. I mean, obviously, that Mississippi State one when he hit all the 3s was huge. And you got to give Grant a little bit of a pass because of the foul trouble tonight. 

“But those four guys, I think, are determined to change the narrative about this team on the defensive end. And I liked what I saw after the first four minutes. I gotta go look at the video on those first four minutes, to be honest with you. I don’t really know why it was as bad as it was. I know there was a couple of plays I remember. but we got to be better to start games. But they hung in there, hung in there, talked about the right stuff. When they had chances at the timeout, we did get better.”

Oats on analytical categories he looks at more than others after games…

“I like to look at the leverage numbers. Are we better with you on the floor on the defensive end than when you’re off? Are we better with you on the floor on the offensive end than when you’re off? Obviously, there’s some luck involved. Guy hits a banked 3 when you’re on the floor and it had nothing to do with you, so it’s not end all, be all. But I tell you guys, we get enough data through the course of the year – practice data, game data, all that – by this point in the season, the stats that we is not luck based on small sample sizes. It’s we’re either better with you on the floor on the defensive end or we’re worse with you on the floor and defensive end. And if we’re worse, we’ve got all the data to show why. Is our team defensive leverage not good? Whatever it is, we can show you. 

“That’s the thing when we recruit guys, I’m gonna tell them, like, I’m not going to promise you any amount of minutes. What I will promise you is you’re gonna get a fair shake. And if you’re not playing as much as you want to play, you’re gonna know exactly why. We’re gonna sit you down and show you, and we got plenty of stats to show guys why. 

“Depending on the game and what we emphasize going into it, would probably send me to offensive rebounding percentage. It wasn’t the top two or three things we stressed this game, but it’s one we’ve got to get better at, and we weren’t very good. They’re 27% on our offensive rebounding percentage. So we’re trying to have that at 40%-plus, and we’ve been at 50% or above on some of the rebounding teams in the country. So to only have it at 27% – and nothing against Kentucky. They’ve got some really good bigs. But I felt like we could take advantage of our guards going in there and getting some tough rebounds. And we didn’t. So that’ll be one thing we address in our cleanups. 

“The turnover percentage was way too high at 19%. That needs to be down under 15, closer to 10. So turnovers was a big thing. And then the defensive execution. The amount of 3s we wanted Kentucky to get up – Carr hit three of their nine. So that’s a little bit on the scouting report. The fact that Brea got 10 off is an issue because he wasn’t supposed to get any up. Obviously, that’s hard to do. He’s that good. So when I go back through and look at the video, how did he get his 10 3s up and what can we fix from that?”

Oats on what this win can do for confidence for tough final stretch…

“This was, without calling it a must-win, I mean we can’t drop three in a row with the next, what do we got, four left now after this? We’ve got Mississippi State at home, at Tennessee, Florida at home, Auburn on the road. What are the rankings? Florida is second in the country, is that right? Yeah, so we’ve got Mississippi State is top 25, then we go to Tennessee, that’s sixth, is that right? Florida at home, that’s second, then we gotta go to No. 1. So our three are top six – one, two and six. I don’t know if anybody’s played one, two and six in the three-game stretch anywhere in the country this year, let alone to close the year out.

“But we needed this one tonight. And we’re not going to focus on Tennessee until we get through with Mississippi State. And we’re not going to focus on Florida until we’re through with Tennessee. And we just got to take it one at a time. The good thing with playing a schedule like this is you’re not going to play three games in a row like that until you get to the Elite Eight, Final Four, championship game, if we’re fortunate enough to get that far. So we’re literally playing three teams that are going to be one or two seeds back to back to back, and Mississippi State’s playing for a good seed in the NCAA Tournament, too. 

“So outside of maybe the SEC Tournament, we’re not going to see three teams like this until maybe an Elite Eight, Final Four, if we’re fortunate enough to get there. So at least we’ll have some experience playing very good teams back to back to back.”

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