Alabama basketball fights to win over McNeese State

Alabama was heavily favored at home tonight against a tough McNeese State team, but the visiting Cowboys gave them everything they could as the Tide stood at 72-64.

Alabama was a little hesitant to open this book. McNeese State hit a couple of three-pointers early on and led in the first few minutes of the game. It’s obvious that Nate Oats and Co. are still coming together on offense, as McNeese St. forced them to play in the half court and it just didn’t look fluid. However, the Tide did just enough and took an 11-point lead at the break. The much smaller Cowboys rallied to a tie, the Tide turned the ball over six times and shooting was again suspect at 32% from three and 69% from the foul line. Free throw shooting is becoming a concerning trend.

Whatever Nate Oats said in the locker room seemed to work, at least for a while. Five minutes into the half, the Tide had extended the lead to 21 (57-36), and it looked like the loss had gone as expected. Unfortunately, Alabama may have been a little too comfortable with the situation and McNeese State kept the heat up offensively and defensively. The Cowboys simply wouldn’t let Alabama run, and in the halfcourt the Tide seemed content to stand around and shoot long threes without making much of an effort to follow up. Meanwhile, the Cowboys continued to work hard, turning some long rebounds into easy looks for a 14-1 run that made things pretty dicey.

McNeese State has a total of two players over 6 feet tall, both of whom are 6 feet tall, but they were neck and neck with an Alabama team that had four players tall of 1.80 m and more. The Tide actually didn’t shoot too badly at 44% overall, 70% from the line and 33% from three, but 15 total turnovers limited them to just 50 shot attempts compared to McNeese State’s 61. The defense played hard to keep the score at bay Cowboys kept things low and blocked four shots. Grant Nelson led the Tide with 22 points and eight boards.

This Alabama team has a ton of talent, but when the opposing team gets back on defense, it looks like a big mess on offense. Nate Oats spoke before the season about how managing minutes would be a challenge, and if it continues, he may have to shorten the rotation to find five players who can operate in the halfcourt. They’ve managed to keep the score at 3-0, but with the upcoming schedule they could be looking at 3-6 if they don’t get there quickly. Next up is a matchup against a very good Purdue team on Friday evening.

Hope for the best.

Roll Tide.