Jumbo Package: Entitled Tide Turns Turtle in Tuscaloosa Trouncing

Ordinarily, we try to Gump on this day; however, one can be forgiven for just not quite being in the spirit after the No. 4 Crimson Tide basketball team finally returned to its home floor and then proceeded to shart out the worst display of hoops we have quite literally seen in years, in a ten-point loss to the No. 21 Ole Miss Rebels.

The final score was 74-64, but that doesn’t quite do justice to how thorough of a deserved asskicking the Tide took after a lazy, selfish, soft, unmotivated, and frankly stupid 40 minutes of play that should have many of these guys questioning whether they are trying to go pro in the NBA or State Farm. Disgust doesn’t quite measure up in terms of adjectives I have for this one.

It was far, far worse than 10 points. And how Alabama lost is even more frustrating the double-digit stomping they inflicted upon themselves.

• 75% through the game, Alabama was averaging a TO every 90 seconds, and it finished with a season-high 21.
• The Tide had more turnovers (21) than made baskets (20).
• Somehow, a terrible shooting perimeter team that relies on volume decided to both shoot worse than usual, and also heave up a season-low 20 attempts from beyond the arc. But at least they also shot 25%!
• With six minutes left, Grant alone had almost as many turnovers (5) as Ole Miss (7).
• The Tide’s big men accounted for 13 combined turnovers — Ole Miss had 9 as a team all night.
• Bama committed turnovers in 7 of their first 10 possessions — I reiterate that Ole Miss had nine all night.
• Alabama’s iffy offensive rebounding was positively miserable, as the Tide continually let the smallest team in the SEC (and the 329th shortest in the country) beat them to the rim, and hold Bama to just four OREB. Worse, the Rebs matched Alabama almost board-for-board (39-36). This was a Rebels squad that was outrebounded by 22 against a similar-sized Memphis team.
• And, on that note, Ole Miss actually had more points in the paint, second-chance points, and points off turnovers.
• The terrible effort on the glass, a cold night from the floor, a surfeit of turnovers, and simple laziness allowed Ole Miss to have the most floor shots they’ve had in regulation in six years (70).

There are a string of awful performances and low-lights to choose from, with nothing but bad to report: the ball movement was non-existent, the ball control was worse, Alabama refused to chase their misses, they refused to play position defense on the interior, the bench refused to match-up on Dia who was running roughshod over a smaller lineup, etc.

There’s no sugar coating this one. There are no mitigators. There is nothing take from it, or silver lining: It was bad basketball, poorly coached and executed worse. And you have every right to be mad about it.

I, for one, am glad that the Tide didn’t manage to come back and hit a few perimeter shots to steal a late win, and I’m certainly glad it was a decisive beating. They deserved to lose, and the worst thing imaginable for the psyche of this team would have been to let them off the hook for their ineptitude and sloth.

In December, I wrote this going into the Kent State game:

I simply don’t believe in this group in the long-term…I think, for all the talk of back-to-the-OG, you can’t expect a tiger to change its stripes. The Tide will shoot poorly from the perimeter, they will be outhustled far too often, they will have some inexplicable defensive lapses, they will commit too many stupid turnovers while forcing few of their own. And, in the end, they’ll simply out-talent an opponent who plays harder. We’ve seen it 6-7 times already this year. No reason to believe that changes today. I think it’s going to take losing three or four in a row to open SEC play before it really sinks in.

All of that happened again last night, and those stripes reemerged…but their talent couldn’t save them. Good. With a morning trip to Rupp up next, a whole lot has to change. But I fear we have only seen a reprieve the last few games, and not a true turning of the corner. And, if you dread that was the real Alabama on display in Coleman last night, you can be forgiven — even justified. We’ve seen this version far too often this year.

I love Alabama basketball, and I love Nate Oats and his brand of pell-mell analytical nuttiness. And at the end of the day I want to love this team…but they’re giving me few reasons to trust them. Nor can I drink from a half-full glass and say “it’s just one game — there are still 14 to go.” Because as of this morning, that sounds more like a threat than an opportunity.

“It’s disgusting” — Nate Oats:

I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this pissed off, or his voice so hoarse — it’s going to be a rough day in practice this afternoon. Bet on it.

Of course, Nate didn’t throw his guys under the bus. He stood in the line of fire and accepted the blame for not having the team ready.

In the post-game press conference Oats started off his opening statement by saying “Not one of our better showings…” Oats was highly upset at the outcome of this game saying “I have to do a better job of making sure guys are ready to go” he continued in the statement reiterating “We didn’t have our guys ready to go…” when speaking on playing against this Ole Miss defense.

In fact, he was encouraging of players who had a particularly rough game, like Grant and Holloway — and I was more than concerned about Aden going into this one. He’s been disastrous against pressure defense.

“Just keep going to the gym, keep shooting them, everybody on the team, every single day, come and put in work and getting better.”

Read More: Oats: We Didn’t Have Our Guys Ready… |

Well, let us at least turn our anger outward:

After the game, this jagoff right here decided to drag his wife-beating keister onto our campus and take a dump all over the program:

Someone asked me yesterday, “why do we hate Chris Beard, beyond the obvious.” There ya’ go. That’s just who he is — a loudmouth, graceless batterer.

But if Chris wants to talk basketball bona fides, here’s the head-to-head:

• Coach A:
  218 wins, one Final Four, one Sweet 16, two conference titles, one felony arrest.

Coach B:

• 227 wins, one Final Four, three Sweet 16s, five conference championships.

This scumbag can’t get to Miami fast enough.

Finally! Some good Gump!

LSU wants to proclaim its 2019 team as the GOAT, but CBS Sports is ready to make the argument that I have long-maintained: the 2020 Crimson Tide team was a generational one. Legitimately one of the 3-4 best teams I’ve ever seen in my life, and up there in their own way with the 1996 Cornhuskers:

Everyone has their own way of trying to qualify the results of a disjointed 2020 season impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. And while some programs have results that are overlooked, excused or given an asterisk, I think it would be irresponsible to dock Alabama points in the conversation of all-time greats when the Crimson Tide had to deal with many of the same hiccups and irregularities as everyone else.

Five Alabama players were unanimous All-Americans, two were Heisman Trophy finalists and DeVonta Smith made history as the first wide receiver to win the award since Tim Brown. A 52-46 shootout win against Florida in the SEC Championship Game was the only one-score result of Alabama’s 13-game campaign; the Crimson Tide defeated opponents by an average of 29.1 points per game. The offense bowled over everyone, scoring 38 or more in every regular-season game. Even the most-hyped contests, like showdowns with top-five Georgia or top-15 Texas A&M, were turned into blowouts that showcased how Alabama was playing on a different tier than everyone else in the sport.

Good stuff here.

As part of the offseason staff realignment, Alabama brought in another Wommack-affiliated coach to join the staff. Former Alabama LB Jason Jones:

Jones is expected to work with Alabama’s cornerbacks, a position he played when he was a student at Alabama in the late 1990s.

Jones graduated from Alabama in 2001 after playing for the Crimson Tide in the late 1990s. He recently spent two seasons as the cornerbacks coach at North Carolina.

Before his most recent coaching experience in Chapel Hill, Jones coached with Kane Wommack at Indiana from 2020-2022, FAU in 2019, and Ole Miss from 2013-2018, where he coached with Kane Wommack’s father, Dave Wommack.

Read More: Alabama Officially Adds Former DB to Coaching Staff

That is nice and all, but corners weren’t Alabama’s problem last season. And we still have no word on changes that must be made at underperforming positions, like defensive line and RBC. Not to mention that Nick Sheridan-sized elephant in the room at OC. (Though I do harbor a dread suspicion that he will be given one more year to try and prove after a ten-year career, at three different schools, “this time will be different, I swear!”) And many are getting some big ole’ Dave Rader / Mike Shula vibes wafting off of uncritical, perhaps-misguided loyalty in the face of plainly unacceptable returns.

We shall see, but I know which way I’m leaning: Offensive coordinators rarely evolve into schematic geniuses. The grow and improve, for sure. But it’s a position where early returns are generally indicative of career trajectory, and Sheridan has just never had it.

In the no-brainer department, guess who was named to the Freshman All-American team. He’s only 17 too!

The 6-foot, 175-pound Williams led Alabama in receiving yards in 2024, with 865, and receiving touchdowns, with eight. he finished second on the team in catches, with 48.

“Ryan’s a first-class guy all the way, through and through,” Crimson Tide head coach Kalen DeBoer said during the season. “I love coaching him. He brings a great work ethic, smile, all the things you want each and every day in practice.”

Williams earned second-team All-America honors from the American Football Coaches Association. He was voted first-team All-SEC and to the league’s all-freshman team by the conference’s coaches, while also earning a second-team All-SEC nod from the Associated press.

Congratulations to Ryan. But, if we’re being honest with ourselves here, ZB deserved at least an honorable mention nod too. Zabien was third on the team in PBU, second in passes defended, was third in the secondary in tackles, third in the secondary in solo tackles, and tied for first in interceptions — with two of those being game-sealing picks.

Finally, I leave you with a really cool study on whether rotations actually matter in gymnastics. Do you lead with your best? Anchor with your best? Try and bridge good-average-good?

We have the first definitive study of it, and the results are interesting:

Together, these findings suggest that moving a gymnast earlier in a lineup may not have a negative impact on their performance. Instead, gymnasts may continue to rank similarly (relative to their teammates) even after being moved earlier, potentially due to having established a preconception of their rank based on past achievements.

Conclusion

Based on the findings above, there does appear to be some merit in the assumption that scores build over the course of the rotation. However, it should be noted that the correlation between a later lineup position and a higher score is not indicative of causation–that is, a later position does not necessarily cause a higher score. Instead, we have a chicken and egg problem, especially since the assumption that scores build has been widely-held for quite some time. It is possible that gymnasts are scored better in alignment with the common assumption due to their position later in the lineup, but it is also possible that coaches place gymnasts later in the lineup because they are notching higher scores.

Additionally, our analysis showed there are certain situations in which the common assumption may not hold as strongly (e.g., on beam, where having a solid lead-off may be more important than having scoring potential strictly rise from one lineup position to another), particularly when controlling for particular lineups or gymnasts. That said, the controlled analyses may have been subject to selection bias–for example, if there was a confounding factor among gymnasts who switched lineup positions, which would make the analysis controlled for particular gymnasts unique to such gymnasts, rather than generally applicable.

Worth a read, with the gymnastics season just starting up in earnest.

That’s it for now. Have a great day, and Roll Tide