How Nate Oats Handled Alabama Basketball's Bye Week

For the first time, the SEC slate featured a bye week built into the schedule. Here's now Nate Oats and his team handled the change.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — The SEC basketball schedule featured a bye week for the first time this season, meaning every team gets one Saturday to Saturday stretch without playing a midweek game. 

The Alabama basketball team is coming off its bye week, having not played since last Saturday against LSU. 

Head coach Nate Oats said that the first half of the week was spent heavily focused on defense. Monday and Tuesday featured almost entirely defense-specific focus, as the Crimson Tide currently has the No. 73 defensive efficiency in the country per KenPom and improving that side of the floor has been stressed all season by the coaching staff.

On Wednesday, the team was given an off-day to keep its legs fresh, followed by preparations for Saturday's game against Texas A&M on Thursday and Friday.

"I thought it was one of our better practices. I think we've got some guys more focused on defense and playing harder on defense," Oats said during his Friday press conference. "We were able to work on a few different things defensively, not all of them directly apply to this game, but just some of the overall intensity and attention to detail on defense has been better."

Oats said he told that team that at some point during the week, most of the players had their individual best practice of the entire season. 

Based on the successes of the week's practices, it appears that the inclusion of the bye week has been beneficial for the Crimson Tide, and Oats agrees. 

"You kind of get your legs back up under you," Oats said. "I gave them totally off Wednesday to try to get them rest, and then went lighter Thursday and Friday to try to make sure their legs are under them for the stretch run."

Oats said it also allowed the team to work on things that aren't necessarily specific to the upcoming game, due to the amount of time the team has to practice before preparation has to begin.

"We've been able to focus on some special situation-type stuff," Oats said. "Whatever you've been struggling with, when you've got a week between games you can kind of focus on that."

Throughout the SEC this season, teams coming off a bye have been incredibly successful. Only one team has lost coming off a bye at this point in the season, and that loss was Vanderbilt, who had to play a Tennessee team also coming off a bye. Teams playing off a bye currently have a record of 5-1.

The bye for Alabama seems to have come at a perfect time, coming off back-to-back road games against Auburn and LSU giving the team some much-needed rest before the final stretch run of the season.

The Crimson Tide's final seven games of the regular season have very few breaks, if any. Four of the seven games are Quad 1 opportunities, including three road games against tough teams in Kentucky, Ole Miss and Florida. The home games aren't a walk in the park either, outside of the finale against SEC bottom-dweller Arkansas, Alabama plays host to Texas A&M, Florida and Tennessee, all in the top-half of the SEC standings.

"You know, three weeks from [Saturday], there will be an SEC champion crowned. The regular season's over three weeks from tomorrow," Oats said. "It seems like it's flown by and we're getting close to the end. We want to make sure guys are fresh."

Oats is seeking his third SEC regular season title in four years, and his team has positioned itself in as good a spot as any as the final three weeks of the regular season begin. 

The results on the court will show for themselves against Texas A&M, but all signs point to the bye week being one that could propel the Crimson Tide even closer towards some hardware within the next month.

See also:

Where is Alabama Basketball Projected in the NCAA Tournament?