| MBB/WBB đźŹ€ No. 9/9 Alabama Outlasts No. 14/13 Houston, 83-82, to Claim Second-Straight Top-15 Win

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Terrific angle. Needs to be sent to ESPN.
Interesting thing is that worse case it was going to graze the front of the rim. It definitely was not going to go in. However if it would have grazed the front of the rim that would be goaltending. Was very close!!!!

Still hard to understand how we had so much trouble blocking out against these guys. They owned us on the boards. I guess we could say that you play these games to expose your problem areas. Well it succeeded. I will say these guys have a better schedule in these OOC games that I was expecting. Houston at least on the court has been the toughest team we have played. Bama will likely see these guys again.
 
Still hard to understand how we had so much trouble blocking out against these guys. They owned us on the boards. I guess we could say that you play these games to expose your problem areas. Well it succeeded. I will say these guys have a better schedule in these OOC games that I was expecting. Houston at least on the court has been the toughest team we have played. Bama will likely see these guys again.

Yep, and if Bama had lost, that would have been why. Some rebounds took unlucky bounces and went right to their guys, some were ill-timed jumps on the rebound attempts by our guys, but most were the Cougars just outworking Bama for them. I don't have the best memory, but I don't recall getting dominated like that on the offensive boards, from tip to buzzer. There's been some bad stretches over the years, but usually a timeout or halftime chewing gets things right. Last night, it was just a constant issue, but credit needs to go to Houston for that too... they flat out played hard and worked for them. I don't think it was Bama bring soft. But, 2 rebounds combined for Bediako and Gurley... not good.

I'll add that, as for the final play and "controversy"... I think the no-call was correct, but I don't really get all the angst I've seen about it (elsewhere). Just like in football, be good enough to overcome questionable/bad calls. Alabama was. Just as the Tide would have lost based on poor rebounding and Houston's 2nd chance points (23 to 8), Houston lost that game with poor free throw shooting (58%) and putting Bama on the line too often (24 of 31). If anything, Houston is lucky that the officials chilled out a bit on their fouls in the 2nd half when they had half the team treading water in foul trouble.

On to a struggling by talented Memphis team, with a quick turnaround. This is a bit of a trap game IMO in how it's setting up. I expect Alabama to win, but they are coming off 2 monster wins and facing a Memphis team that's lost 4 straight and isn't gong to look real good (in terms of potential) on film. A good test for the leadership this week.
 
Interesting thing is that worse case it was going to graze the front of the rim. It definitely was not going to go in. However if it would have grazed the front of the rim that would be goaltending. Was very close!!!!

Still hard to understand how we had so much trouble blocking out against these guys. They owned us on the boards. I guess we could say that you play these games to expose your problem areas. Well it succeeded. I will say these guys have a better schedule in these OOC games that I was expecting. Houston at least on the court has been the toughest team we have played. Bama will likely see these guys again.

I don't mean this in a bad way because we ended up winning, but they just had more toughness in them a lot of the time. I saw Bediako get out muscled/outhustled atleast three times I recall specifically. Houston, to me, played like a team that had a lot to prove and they just kept fighting. They will be dangerous, as we will, in the tournament. Both are Top 10 teams from what I have seen so far this season.
 
To me, rebounding is about guts, want to, a willingness to get physical, and an ability to read a shot coming off of the rim. It doesn’t hurt to be a quick leader either. Best way to determine who has those qualities is to put the bubble on the rim at practice and have them beat the shit out of each other to find out who wants it most. IMHO Gary and Davison our two most likely to fit what I described. Ellis would be 3rd, followed by Shack.
 
I saw Bediako get out muscled/outhustled atleast three times I recall specifically.
All of our guys in the paint got out muscled/out hustled. No way to hide that. Oats needs to challenge shall I say their manhood.

Bediako is young and I expect him to get better and better. Same with Davidson. This should be an area that improves significantly. It certainly needs to if these guys are going to be serious contenders. Like I said earlier the difficult OOC schedule is designed to toughen up the team and expose what they need to work on. It worked.
 
^^^. Not enough coaches have the unction to apologize after an emotional outburst. Hats off to Coach Sampson for showing respect for the game of basketball. You make a mistake, apologize, learn from it, and move on.
 
Last Saturday Bama steamrolls UGA for the SEC championship in Atlanta and then beats Gonzaga on their turf later that night.

This Saturday, Bryce claims the Heisman trophy in NYC and Bama wins a thriller against a really good Houston team for the night cap.

What a time to be a Bama fan… what can we do next Saturday?
Fire up the grill, drink beer and rest my aging heart. :laugh:
 
Yep, takes a move from a decent person nowadays to go back and apologize. I'm a fiery competitor myself, so I get Sampson, but you better be right if you pull a stunt like that. Good for him calling the AD and our Coach.

Even better was his one guy picking up the garbage thrown by his teammate. That was a class move in my mind. Especially right after that ending when the team us upset and the crowd is howling right at you.
 
Even if they had reviewed it, my totally unbiased opinion :), there wasn't enough evidence to overturn it. From every angle I saw, the ball was already partially below the rim on the way down.
 
Even if they had reviewed it, my totally unbiased opinion :), there wasn't enough evidence to overturn it. From every angle I saw, the ball was already partially below the rim on the way down.

None. It went straight up and would not have hit the rim and the ball was partially below the rim. I've seen a few different angles and none of them are favorable to Houston.
 
Had military duties over the weekend, so I didn't stay up to watch it. Ended up watching a replay the game. Favorite moment was a brief moment the camera went to Bryan Hogdson ripping into Charles Bediako for not boxing out and giving up another rebound. Needless to say, he probably wasn't happy with Saturday's result since he coaches the big men. We were not attacking the glass and Houston was way more aggressive - which sort of helped us since they were undisciplined in their fouls.

My personal take: while it wasn't high quality basketball, that was clearly two heavy weights going at it for 40 minutes. The intensity, execution, coaching, and emotion mirrored what we'll see in March.

Sorry for the language also, but Dan Dakich can get fucked for the way he's going after Oats on Twitter.

This is the best basketball team I've ever seen at Alabama, so I'm going to soak it all in. I saw reddit and social media explode in rage after we won, so we're doing something right. Once Oats cuts down those Final Four nets, the internet will cease to exist. Auburn fans took the Houston loss worse than Cougar fans. Make sure to remind them of the quality loss Bama will give them in conference play.
 
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