Nate Oats may have just put the cart before the horse when comparing this year's Alabama Crimson Tide to his final four team
The Alabama Crimson Tide made it through the most dangerous weekend in sports. Surviving what would have been some major upsets, Alabama has yet to play their best ball, but they are in the Sweet 16 nonetheless. And while it may be a little early to say this year's team is better than last's, Nate […]
The Alabama Crimson Tide made it through the most dangerous weekend in sports.
Surviving what would have been some major upsets, Alabama has yet to play their best ball, but they are in the Sweet 16 nonetheless.
And while it may be a little early to say this year's team is better than last's, Nate Oats has no problem doing so…
2025 Crimson Tide better equipped for championship run than final four team?
"Yeah, for sure. We're definitely deeper with more guys available," said Oats when asked if this year's team is better equipped than last year's for a deep run, via video from Bama 247." I thought Derrion Reid was great on Friday. Didn't work out to play him as many minutes this game, but we have guys 10. I'm comfortable playing double digit minutes. Grant Nelson was hurt. We got away without playing him hardly at all. Darrion was part of that, being able to not play Grant until about seven minutes to go in that game…
"…Whether it's injuries, foul trouble, just depth to wear teams out, guys just not playing well and you need somebody else to step up, I definitely think we've got it. No doubt, they stepped up big from last year's run, even today. They went two bigs a lot. Two seven-footers out there."
There is no reason to believe that Oats is wrong. The top two players on last year's final four team are back and have been back via Grant Nelson and Mark Spears, and they look even better despite Nelson's recent knee injury.
Pair that with a deeper roster and maybe the team is better equipped. But when you are two wins away from even getting back to said Final Four, it feels a little premature to mention that with a high-flying BYU team on the horizon come Thursday night.
