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Bama News
Alabama lives and dies by the 3-pointer, and that is nothing new. Coach Nate Oats' first two Crimson Tide teams were the same way, although this year's edition does not appear to have the same caliber of outside shooters. As such, Alabama has shot itself out of a number of games this season, including on Saturday in a 66-55 home loss to Kentucky. After the game, Oats addressed the Tide's 3-point shooting struggles and whether the team can change its approach midseason as it now is shooting just 30.5% from deep.
“We’d like to get the ball to the rim," Oats said, via BamaOnLine. "We did get downhill to the rim. And that’s the thing, we’ve kind of shown how we play here. We set SEC records in both our first two years for 3s made in a game. We’re gonna take 3s, but if people really study how we play this year, we’re scoring way more at the rim than we are from 3, too. And the floor’s spread. You’ve got slashers, you’ve got drives. We got the ball to the rim a fair amount. The issue is we missed those, too. We shot 13-of-25 at the rim. And we don’t have a huge post-up presence.
“... Over the season, if you’ve got shooters – and I feel like we do — I know right now we’re not making shots. Shoot, after tonight, we might be last in the league in 3-point percentage. I think we were 13th coming in. But all of the sudden, you can’t re-recruit a roster to start posting the ball up. And to be honest with you, if you look at post-up points per possession in college basketball, those points per possession aren’t very high either. So I do think getting the ball downhill, getting more paint touches in the possession, trying to get to the free-throw line – we didn’t make free throws at a high clip either tonight. That was an issue. But there’s subtle adjustments to make, but you’re not gonna, over the course of a game, all of the sudden change who you are. That’s impossible to do.”
The Tide has been one of the nation's most inconsistent teams this season, beating Gonzaga and Baylor while also losing to Georgia and Missouri, the SEC's two worst teams. It appeared that Alabama may have figured it out for good when it dismantled Baylor at home last weekend, but non-competitive losses to Auburn and Kentucky have changed things. Alabama went just 3-for-30 from 3-point range against the Wildcats, one of the worst outside shooting performances of any SEC team this season.
Alabama is now down to 4-6 in the SEC, although the Tide's NCAA Tournament resume remains strong thanks to its portfolio of signature wins. But the Tide is just a half-game out of 12th place ahead of Mizzou, Ole Miss and Georgia, so Wednesday's trip to Ole Miss will be a big one for its chances of turning things around in the SEC standings.
