Second Half Defense Sparks Alabama Basketball In Victory Over South Carolina

After a slow start, Nate Oats' Crimson Tide defense tightened up in the second half en route to a crucial 74-47 victory in conference play.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — After a 9-5 (1-0) start to the season, Alabama basketball came into Tuesday night's matchup with 13-1 (1-0) South Carolina looking for an improved performance on the defensive end after surrendering 75 points to a lowly Vanderbilt offense on Saturday in Nashville. 

The Commodores, who now sit at 5-9 (0-1) thanks to a 78-75 loss at the hands of the Crimson Tide, ranked last in the conference in points per game at 68.9 — a full 5.6 points lower than second-to-last place team Texas A&M. 

With Lamont Paris' red-hot Gamecocks rolling into town, Alabama head coach Oats knew that a step forward had to be made if the Crimson Tide were to advance to 2-0 in conference play. 

Step forward they did — and more. 

Holding a 30-29 lead at the break, Oats' message was simple and sweet: Play harder.

"He basically told us we're not playing hard enough," Alabama guard Aaron Estrada said. "You know, they were beating us in a blue collar points because they're like the tally of all that, for both teams, and they were kind of up on us on the blue collar. And they like showed us clips of where we messed up. And we kind of just took it personally, you know, we don't want water to come in our gym and play harder than us."

For South Carolina, the second half was a disaster — shooting an abysmal 6-for-27 from the field over the final 20 minutes of action while being out-rebounded 24-12 by the Crimson Tide.

"They were switching some stuff," Gamecock head coach Lamont Paris said. "We had a hard time getting the ball into the posts. I thought we looked fatigued a little bit honestly. And looking at the minutes and I don't think we should have been based on how that breakdown went. But they switched some stuff which which made it more difficult for us to get the ball into the post. We'd like to get the ball into the post. I think we settled for some jump shots."

While Oats was satisfied with his team's performance in the 74-47 victory, he's hoping to see his starting five get out to quicker starts regardless of their improved effort. 

"Start of the game wasn't where it needed to be after we got down," Oats said. 'I thought it was pretty good. I thought we competed on defense last half, even a little bit more than the last half of the first half [...] So we were very competitive, competed hard for probably the last 35 minutes or so. They came we, just get it, I don't know if we've got to make a change to improve the start, or the starters just got to get together a little bit more to start the game out, but I thought for 35 minutes we competed pretty hard."

[this story will be updated]

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