Ole Miss strikes a nerve with Alabama coach Nate Oats over 'disgusting' effort

As No. 21 Ole Miss knocked down No. 4 Alabama on the road, 74-64, Tuesday night in Tuscaloosa, it was apparent Crimson Tide head coach Nate Oats would not be happy.

Apparently Ole Miss was able to strike a nerve with the Alabama coach as in his postgame press conference, he called the effort from his team, “disgusting.” Meanwhile, Ole Miss head coach Chris Beard notched the first road win over a Top 5 opponent in program history.

Oats’ opening statement… “Obviously, not one of our better showings. You gotta give Ole Miss a ton of credit. They came ready on the road. We did not come ready. I gotta figure out how to do a better job making sure our guys are ready to go. Our first 10 possessions, we had seven turnovers. We’ve been having some issues with turnovers throughout the year. This defense turns people over, and we didn’t have our guys ready to go and not it turn over. 

“And then maybe the most disappointing thing on the night, in my opinion, was our lack of effort on the offensive glass. I don’t know if our didn’t realize that’s what’s been keeping our offense going. We haven’t been shooting it particularly well. We’ve had too many turnovers. Our offense hasn’t been great this year, but the offensive rebounding rate’s been really saving us in some of these games. And I believe the one offensive rebound in the first half on the box score, I believe, was given to Jarin and on the missed dunk. I think they gave a miss field goal/offensive rebound/turnover. So I think essentially we had zero offensive rebounds in the first half, and then we ended the game with with three if you take the one off. You shouldn’t reward a missed dunk with an offensive rebound for hanging on the rim.

“So to go from 23 against A&M, who’s one of the toughest teams in the country – and Ole Miss is tough, too. Nothing to take away from. But you can’t go from 23 to three and expect to win the game. Ole Miss’ defense is very good. Coach Beard always had great defensive teams. Coach Adams is over there helping them. He’s always had great defensive teams. They’re switching definitely messed with us. As a staff, I thought we had our guys ready to go. We obviously did not. We’ve got to do a way better job. A&M’s got a similar defense, but they don’t switch one through five, on and off the ball like Ole Miss did as much. And for a few times that we were able to make then pay the rest of the game, we just got super stagnant. We only had 11 assists to 21 turnovers, and we just weren’t ready to go. 

“And you know what? Defensively, we definitely had some mistakes, and we should have been better. But we lost this game on the offensive end. We lost the game with our turnovers, our lack of effort on the offensive glass. Guys that we count on to go get offensive rebounds came through with nothing for us tonight, and we got to do a better job making sure our guys mentally are ready to go and understand how tough these games are every single night out in the SEC.”

Oats on how concerned he is about the direction of Alabama’s offense… “I think we should all be pretty concerned, to be honest with you. We’re not aggressive, other than on the rebounds. The guards didn’t come off attacking a switch like we tried to coach them to do. We’re not shooting the ball very well. But part of that is we’re not getting very good shots. I mean, we only shot 20 threes. Now, part of that was their switching because they’d switch and our guys wouldn’t be ready to attack the switch, and then you’re not pulling the help in.

“I think we will figure it out. I think Coach Pannone, Coach Bauman and myself spend most of the time on the offensive side, and we’ll spend a lot of time evaluating this one. But we’re going to definitely have to get back to getting to the offensive boards. That’s been saving our offense. I don’t know if the guys just felt like they didn’t need to anymore or what, but that obviously didn’t work very well for us.”

Oats on his disappointment in his team’s effort in a game to stay in first place in the SEC… “It’s disgusting, to be honest with you. With the amount of fifth-year seniors we have and the leadership that should be shown on this team, to have guys come in ready to play, it’s – look, it starts with me, because I’m supposed to be the one motivating these guys, and I obviously didn’t motivate them very well to make sure they’re ready. 

“So I’m gonna have to look in the mirror and see what I did, didn’t do. I’m gonna have to have a good talk with some of these seniors that are supposed to be on leaders and figure out why we weren’t ready to go tonight because it’s very disappointing. It’s disgusting, and it’s frustrating.”

“It’s not like we lost to a bad team. This is a really good team. They’re in first place. Them and Auburn are tied now for first place in the league. We didn’t lose because they were just a far superior team tonight. I felt like we lost because they came ready to play. They brought energy. They brought effort. And we did not. That’s a frustrating way to lose.”

Oats on if he sees Ole Miss as a double-bye team in the SEC Tournament… “They’re proving it right now. I mean, they’ve got two tough road wins. Their style is a little bit different than most, particularly on the defensive end. They’ve got good, hard-nosed, tough players. You look at some of the guys, they’ve got seven kids on that team that scored 1,000 points or more in their career. So the way they looked tonight, I think they should be in the mix to win the whole thing, not just be a double-bye team. I think they’re gonna be in the mix to win the whole thing. 

“I mean, at this point, four games in, we no longer have full control of our own destiny since we don’t get them again. Somebody else is gonna have to beat them. We’re gonna have to take care of business. They’re gonna be in the mix, I think. They’re a good team. You gotta give them a bunch of credit for the way we played tonight, too. I’m disappointed with our effort, the way we came out ready to play. You got to give them a ton of credit with the way they guard, the way they play. They were ready to go.”

Oats on the problems Ole Miss forward Malik Dia presented… “He obviously presented a lot tonight. We knew he was good. I thought some of their guards had been some other higher scores coming in. But when we switched, he seemed to be able to punish us on the switch a little bit more. He got it inside. When he did miss, he went right back up, got his own misses a lot. He was a problem for us tonight. We may have screwed up some of the matchups. He played 31 minutes. I didn’t play Cliff nearly as much. I probably should have played Cliff more, matched up with him, switched less. He was an issue tonight. We gotta do a better job preparing for bigs like that.”