Trending with the Tide: The Good News and Bad News Around Alabama Basketball

A look at the ups and downs around Alabama Athletics over the past week.

Welcome back to Trending with the Tide where we give a stock report of Alabama athletics over the past week. Today we’ll look at some good and bad news surrounding Coleman Coliseum.

Stock rising

The viewing experience for Alabama basketball fans

Things aren’t pretty for the men’s basketball program at the moment. Any momentum gained from an upset win over Baylor on Jan. 29 was snuffed out by back-to-back double-digit defeats to Auburn and Kentucky the past two outings. However, things are getting better for Crimson Tide fans — at least from a viewing experience.

Last week, Tuscaloosa’s City Council voted to approve an application to serve alcohol inside Coleman Coliseum. In the near future, Coleman’s concession provider, Levy FoodService, plans to sell beer, wine, and a hard seltzer at basketball games and gymnastics meets.

Even if alcohol isn’t your thing, there’s a much bigger reason for optimism surrounding the basketball program. Last Friday, the Alabama Board of Trustees voted Friday to approve Stage I of the plan for a new on-campus arena. The state-of-the-art venue will replace 54-year-old Coleman Coliseum as the home of Alabama men’s and women’s basketball as well as gymnastics.

The new arena is set to seat 10,136, a decrease from the 15,383 capacity of Coleman. However, its seats will be positioned closer to the floor which should create a more electric game atmosphere.

Buy or sell: This is a definite buy. Just ask Alabama, which is ready to dole out $183 million to complete the new arena. On top of a better viewing experience for fans, the commitment to the basketball program will go a long way towards recruiting efforts while helping to keep men’s basketball head coach Nate Oats in Tuscaloosa on a long-term basis. Things might be rough now for Alabama fans, but the future is certainly bright.

Alabama gymnastics

The other sport competing inside of Coleman Coliseum is experiencing much better recent results. Alabama’s gymnastics team is coming off its best performance of the season as it recorded a score of 197.875 to win last week’s tri-meet against Western Michigan (194.875) and North Carolina (195.325). The 197.875 mark the Crimson Tide’s highest points total under head coach Dana Duckworth and its best regular-season score since March 2014 against Stanford.

The recent result helped Alabama rebound from a disappointing defeat at Auburn and should help the Crimson Tide build momentum with five meets remaining until the SEC Championships on March 19.

"I think they did exactly what we wanted them to do tonight which was let's be at four events for four events as a team," Duckworth said following last week’s meet. "And was it perfect? No. Is there still more to improve? Yes. But what a great step in our confidence in moving forward."

Buy or sell: This is another buy. Barring its setback at Auburn, Alabama has improved on its scores in each of its meets after beginning the season with a poor 195.875 score at Oklahoma. As BamaCentral’s Katie Windham pointed out Monday, scores have been higher across the nation with 23 perfect 10s already handed out so far this season. Alabama has yet to receive one of those, so there is still room for the Crimson Tide to improve (BUY).

Alabama softball

Patrick Murphy’s Team 26 is set to begin its season on Friday when it faces Southern Utah as part of the Candrea Classic in Tucson, Ariz. After advancing to the final of the Women’s College World Series last season, the Crimson Tide looks poised to make another run to Oklahoma City this year as it sits at No. 2 in the D1Softball preseason rankings.

This year’s Alabama team is stacked with talent as it returns the reigning SEC Pitcher of the Year in Montana Fouts as well as slugging first baseman Kaylee Tow, who were both named to the preseason All-SEC team last week.

Buy or sell: I’m buying this team based on Fouts alone. Last season, the right-hander led the SEC with 349 strikeouts while finishing with a 21-4 record and a 1.61 ERA. That included a perfect game against UCLA in the WCWS. Earlier this week, Murphy said he believes Fouts returns as the top pitcher in the nation.

“Not only is she the best pitcher in college softball, but she’s one of the nicest kids we’ve ever had,” Murphy said on the Hey Coach radio shoe. “She’s the hardest worker. She could have an ego the size of Texas, but she doesn’t. I think that’s why her teammates love to play behind her.”

(BUY)

Stock falling

Alabama men’s basketball’s 3-point shooting.

Right now, the Crimson Tide can’t seem to buy a bucket. Since the beginning of SEC play on Dec. 29, Alabama is a combined 89 of 330 (26.97%) from beyond the arc. Those struggles were put on full display during its last time out as the Crimson Tide made just 3 of 30 shots from deep in its 66-55 loss to Kentucky over the weekend.

Alabama’s 10% shooting against Kentucky was the second-worst in Division I this season among teams with at least 30 3-point attempts in a game. Even worse, the struggles have seeped into other parts of the Crimson Tide’s game as head coach Nate Oats said he believes his team’s poor shooting led to a lack of effort.

“We’ve gotta be a little bit more mentally tough, be able to handle bad shooting nights and still play hard," Oats said following the loss to Kentucky. "We’ve won big games this year when we didn’t shoot it well. Some of our bad losses, we did shoot it well. I thought our defense was better overall than it had been in some of our losses. It’s a good thing, otherwise, we would’ve gotten blown out. But our offense really failed us tonight. We’ve gotta regroup, shoot the ball a little bit better, make sure we’re getting great shots.”

Buy or sell: This Alabama basketball team was assembled before Joshua Primo left for the NBA and Texas Tech guard Nimari Burnett suffered a season-ending knee injury in September. The absence of those two has certainly been evident during the Crimson Tide’s struggles this season.

It’s not that Alabama doesn't have shooters. This is a team that still features Jaden Shackelford, Jahvon Quinerly and Keon Ellis, who are all capable of getting hot from deep. That trio, along with five-star point guard JD Davison, gives the Crimson Tide the ability to beat any team in the nation. However, when it comes to developing consistency from beyond the arc, I just don’t feel that’s in the cards this year. (SELL).