Nate Oats Not Concerned with Shooting Struggles in Exhibition Win

Alabama's offense provided a well-balanced attack across all its players, but didn't shoot as well as Oats would have liked.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — There's always room to improve. 

No. 20 Alabama's 73-64 win over Southern Illinois in Saturday's charity exhibition showed a lot of positives, but also a lot of ways that the Crimson Tide can look to get better as the 2022-23 season rapidly approaches.

After all, isn't that what preseason games are for?

Offensively, Alabama shot just 41 percent in the game, including an uninspiring 3-of-22 from three-point range. Two of those three makes from beyond the arc came from freshman Rylan Griffen — the rest of the Alabama team combined to shoot 1-of-17.

"We didn't shoot it well," Alabama head coach Nate Oats said. "I think we're going to be a pretty good shooting team this year, but for whatever reason we didn't shoot it well today. We'll have to figure out why we're not getting better looks. We got some good looks we've just got to make them. Some of that's going to come with playing together, getting our chemistry a little bit better."

Oats is right to believe Alabama will shoot better as a team going forward considering the percentages that some of his players shot last season. Take transfer guards Mark Sears and Dom Welch for example — both shot over 38 percent from beyond the arc last season, but combined to shoot 1-for-6 against Southern Illinois. 

Oats also believed one of the biggest contributing factors to the poor shooting performance was shot selection, or lack thereof.

"I thought we were passing up some threes that we should have taken," Oats said. "I thought Dom [Welch] passed up a few. We've got to step in and shoot the ball. I'm not overly critical on shot selection, if you're open and you're a shooter, shoot it."

Aside from the shooting, Oats felt that some of his more talented offensive players will have better games in the future.

"I didn't think particular guys played great offensive games," Oats said. 

One player that Oats could have been referencing was five-star freshman Brandon Miller. The 6-foot-8 wing led the Crimson Tide in scoring with 14, but shot just 5-of-13 from the field including no three-point makes in his five attempts. 

Miller has all of the potential to be an offensive star for Alabama from his athleticism and feel for the game to his ability to spot up from most places on the floor. He has even showcased throughout the offseason that he is highly capable of high-scoring outputs, averaging over 20 points per contest on Alabama's trip to Europe and scoring 33 against TCU in a closed scrimmage. 

There is reason to believe Miller will have better games than what he had on Saturday.

"We didn't knock down a lot of threes, but that's just a confidence thing," Miller said.

Even without shooting the ball at a high clip, Alabama still scored 73 points in the game with 44 of those coming in the paint. The Crimson Tide's big man trio of Noah Gurley, Noah Clowney and Nick Pringle all had their way inside against a Southern Illinois team that lacked significant height, all while expected starting center Charles Bediako missed the game with an injury.

"I was really happy with the play from our bigs," Oats said. "Pringle gave us a good 17 minutes, Clowney ended up winning the hard hat award. [...] I thought all three of those guys gave us good minutes, played hard, rebounded the ball well."

Clowney and Pringle, both newcomers to the program this season, led Alabama in rebounding with eight apiece. Pringle scored 10 points while Clowney scored six — all of which came in the first three minutes of the game. Gurley added 12 of his own, looking much more comfortable entering his second year at a high-major school, showing increased elusiveness in the lane against smaller defenders with euro steps and post moves that he utilized very effectively.

With all of Alabama's preseason exhibitions and scrimmages in the rearview mirror, the Crimson Tide now turns its attention to a gauntlet of a non-conference schedule that will begin in just a week. 

Alabama's first test will come from last season's Big South champion and NCAA Tournament participant Longwood, who will visit Coleman Coliseum on Nov. 7 for a 7:30 tipoff.

Oats is confident that Saturday's offensive struggles will not be commonplace once the season begins. 

"We'll have better offensive games.” Oats said. “All in all I was pleased with the effort today.”

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