Three Takeaways from Alabama Basketball's Turnover-Filled Loss to Oregon

The Crimson Tide fell to Oregon 81-75 in the inaugural Players Era Festival Championship on Saturday night.

Alabama guard Latrell Wrightsell Jr. (3) lays the ball up against Oregon at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, NV on Saturday, Nov 30, 2024. / Photo by Crimson Tide Photos / UA Athletics

No. 13 Alabama men's basketball fell to Oregon 81-75 in the inaugural Players Era Festival Championship on Saturday night.

This Las Vegas-based NIL event is the first of its kind as the winning team, that being Oregon, will receive $1.5 million in prize money. Alabama will take home $1.25 million.

There's so much to dissect from this matchup at MGM Grand Garden Arena. Here are three takeaways:

Turnovers Becoming Troublesome

The Crimson Tide had a lot of positives in its Players Era Festival campaign but turnovers were easily its biggest flaw. Alabama committed 20 turnovers in the 95-90 win over Rutgers––the most in a game for the Tide since the 91-71 loss to Tennessee on Jan. 20. this past season.

Fortunately for Alabama, it wasn't until the eighth turnover that Rutgers finally capitalized and scored off of it. However, the giveaways number didn't exactly improve in the second half and the Scarlet Knights then took advantage by finishing the game with 23 points off turnovers.

Saturday night wasn't much different as Alabama gave the ball away 15 times. But this time, Oregon was consistently scoring off of Alabama's turnovers as the Ducks tallied 17 points from them. One of which came late in the game as Crimson Tide forward Grant Nelson gave one away tied at 75 with 1:55 left in regulation, but after a goaltending review, it was confirmed that forward Jarin Stevenson did not record a chase-down block in time that the broadcast was "shocked" it wasn't overturned.

This stat category was pivotal in the game's outcome as Oregon committed eight turnovers and Alabama scored just five points off of them.

“Our turnovers have been kind of haunting us here in Vegas, last game and this game, and the points off turnovers, 17-5," Alabama head coach Nate Oats said during the postgame press conference. "It’s hard to overcome that. We got to figure out a way to take care of the basketball better. It’s everybody. Everybody on the team except for Wrightsell turned the ball over tonight. We had multiple guys with multiple turnovers. Turnovers are 15-8, and the points are 17-5 off turnovers. It’s hard to overcome that. So I think that was the biggest issue."

Depth on Display Once Again

One of the aforementioned positives for Alabama in the Players Era Festival has been the Tide's widespread amount scorers on the stat sheet. Against Rutgers, four Alabama forwards tallied double-digit points. The ball certainly moved around on offense against Houston as forwards Mouhamed Dioubate and Grant Nelson plus guards Mark Sears, Latrell Wrightsell Jr. and Aden Holloway scored 10-plus points.

Once again on Saturday night, five Alabama players scored in the double digits: Labaron Philon (15), Sears (11), Holloway (11), Stevenson (11) and Wrightsell (10).

"We’re pretty balanced," Oats said. "We had five guys in double figures. We tried to get the ball moving. We ended up with 21 assists on a poor shooting night from some of our better shooters, to be honest with you. So I thought we did a good job moving the ball. If we hadn’t turned the ball over 15 times, it would have been good, but we like to see it spread around a little bit.

“We had five guys in double figures, and I think there are other guys––Grant would be a guy that probably will be in double figures more often than not. Cliff [Omoruyi] can obviously be a scorer for us, too. Derrion [Reid] has had games. Mo’s had big games. We’ve got multiple guys capable of scoring double figures. To be able to put on 81 points when we didn’t particularly shoot it well, still turned it over 15 times, I think speaks to the depth that we have. But we got to use our depth and also not turn the ball over.”

Throughout the offseason, Alabama was praised for its absurd amount of depth across the board. The Tide added eight players this offseason, with two of them, Naas Cunningham and Houston Mallette, redshirting. These newcomers have collectively shown a lot of promise to start the season and they're starting to blend well with the five returners.

Latrell Wrightsell’s Impact

Wrightsell went down with a non-contact lower leg injury early in the second half on Saturday night. He stayed down for a little bit and was unable to walk his way to the locker room as he relied on two trainers paving the way with his arms on their shoulders.

After being designated as doubtful to return to the game, he was later shown on the TNT broadcast in an Alabama warmup tracksuit, signifying that he was done for the night with under 10 minutes remaining in regulation.

"[The trainers] are concerned about his Achilles, which obviously wouldn't be good," Oats said during the postgame press conference. "They're going to evaluate him once we get back. He'll get an MRI and see what we've got going. Keeping our fingers crossed."

The 6-foot-3 graduate guard is averaging 11.7 points per game this season with extremely efficient shooting numbers: 49 percent from the field and 41.5 percent from downtown. Coming into Saturday night, Wrightsell led Alabama in threes made this season with 17 through seven games.

However, his status is unknown at this time. It's uncertain when he'll return but it's difficult to be optimistic based on the basketball history of non-contact achilles injury. Without him, Alabama's current guards are Sears, Philon, Holloway, plus transfer Chris Youngblood, who is expected to make his season debut in the near future after suffering a foot injury in the offseason.

As the numbers suggest, Wrightsell has had a big impact on the Crimson Tide's success to start the season. Does Alabama increase minutes for some of these players? Does Alabama remove the redshirt for either Mallette or Cunningham?

The absence of Wrightsell will likely change the game plan a bit, but hopefully he'll make a speedy recovery.