Oats Says Tide Win SEC Title With Wrightsell

Despite a poor performance, pointed out by head coach Nate Oats, Alabama got an exciting 92-88 win in overtime against the Arkansas Razorbacks in Coleman Coliseum on Saturday, March 9. The Tide did not lead at all in regulation.

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Oats highlighted the fight in the Alabama team after the game, "For Multiple guys, things weren't going well. We just hung in there and fought it out."

Oats also highlighted Mark Sears and Latrell Wrightsell Jr. after the game, but not for their pure scoring. Oats said after the game that Sears' leadership against Arkansas was, "as good as he's had all year." Oats hardly talked about Sears' point total, despite his scoring 22 and being only two games behind Reggie King's record for most games with 20 or more points, with at least two games to go in the season.

When asked about Wrightsell returning to the lineup Oats said, "We need him in a bad way. I feel like if we had him in some of those games he was out, we wouldn't have lost some of the ones we did...He made some tough plays. He's probably not quite in good enough shape to play 40 minutes, but he had to."

Oats also mentioned Alabama probably has an SEC regular season title under its belt this season if Wrightsell had not missed four games.

Late in 2022, Alabama suffered a multi-game slide that saw them exit the NCAA tournament early. This year's Alabama team also suffered a slide, losing three out of their last five SEC games. However, Oats doesn't think this team compares to 2022, "The '22 group, we lost our way a little bit. This group is different. I never get the feeling that this group has quit on each other at all...You look at every kid that's playing, even guys that aren't playing, you feel like this group wants to keep playing together."

"This group is different."

They'll have a chance to prove it once they reach Nashville for the SEC Tournament. Alabama will play on Friday, but won't know who their opponent is until the day before.

Tide 100.9 will be on-site in Nashville to provide coverage of the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament. SEC Tournament coverage is sponsored by the Sportsbook at Pearl River Resort.