PLAYERS ERA POWER COLLEGE BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

November 30, 2024

Nate Oats

MGM Grand Garden Arena

Alabama Crimson Tide

Postgame Press Conference

Oregon - 83, Alabama - 81

NATE OATS: Something about the game ... hard on all of us here in Vegas, last game and this game. Points off turnovers 17-5, and it's hard to overcome that. We've got to figure out a way to take care of the basketball better.

Everybody on the team except for Wrightsell turned the ball over. We had multiple guys. It was 15-8, and the points are 17-5 off turnovers. It's hard to overcome that. I think that's the biggest issue.

We still had issues with guarding the post. Didn't shoot it particularly well at stretches tonight. But we've had games like that, and we're going to have to be able to overcome some poor nights and get to the offensive boards.

I thought we did a pretty good job on that. We had 15 O-boards, but they had 12 themselves.

It's not what we were looking to do out here, but it's a good team. We're going to learn from it. We've got to play better and let ourselves regroup for Carolina on Wednesday.

Q. The tournament here obviously it seems like it was a pretty good success, a lot of really good, close games. What do you feel you got out of it overall?

NATE OATS: Yeah, played three really good teams. They all had different styles. We got exposed to different stuff from each of the three teams. I thought the tournament coordinators did a great job.

It was great being here at MGM staying in the same place you're playing. So I enjoyed the tournament. Houston is one of the toughest teams in the country and we had a battle with them. Rutgers has really talented guys. We've got to figure out how to guard elite level players a little better.

Then Oregon is just a really good overall, well-rounded, sound basketball team that did a great job tonight. We've got to take care of the ball better.

So played three really good teams. We learned a lot about ourselves, learned what we've got to fix when we get back to the drawing board and fix some stuff.

Q. Do you have any update on Wrightsell, what happened there?

NATE OATS: He's got a lower leg injury. They're concerned about his Achilles, which obviously wouldn't be good. They're going to evaluate it once we get back to Tuscaloosa, get an MRI, and see what we've got going. Keeping our fingers crossed there.

Q. Nate, you mentioned the team's overall struggles from three, but Jarin Stevenson knocked down three. Just how big has it been for him in these last two games just finding some form and getting his footing going after starting 0-of-18 on the year from deep.

NATE OATS: Yeah, I think this is the Jarin we were looking for this year. It's great that he hung in there and got his confidence going. They made big plays. I thought he was really good for us on defense tonight. Made three threes tonight. Made a couple the game before.

He's going to be a big part of what we do this year. Really happy for him. He got it going. We've got to keep building him up. He's supposed to be a freshman this year.

If you go back to when Clowney was with us, Clowney had a summer start. I can't remember exactly what he was, 1 of 17, 1 of 19, something like that, to start the year out, and hit four of them before the first media timeout against South Dakota State his freshman year.

Similar start to what Clowney had, but he's bounced out of it now, and hopefully this will get him going. He shot it pretty well all over the floor. And he had positive defensive leverage, so I think he's really helping us on the defensive end as well.

Q. You had pretty good balance with your offense today. Looked like you had five guys in double figures. Is that your guys' game?

NATE OATS: Yeah, we're pretty balanced. We had five guys in double figures. We tried to get the ball going. We ended up with 21 assists on a poor shooting night from some of our better shooters, to be honest with you.

I thought we did a good job moving the ball. If we hadn't turned the ball over 15 times it would have been good. We like to see it spread around a little bit. We had five guys in double figure. I think there's other guys. Grant, a big guy that probably will be in double figures more often than not. Cliff can obviously be a scorer for us too. Derrion's had big games. Mo has had a big game. We got multiple guys capable of scoring in double figures.

To be able to put up 81 points when we didn't particularly shoot it well and still turned the ball over 15 times speaks to the depth that we have. We've got to use our depth and also not turn the ball over.