re: Bama Basketball Offseason Megathread

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Who said this? Would love to follow.

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I also like the darker shade of Crimson

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The Crimson Tide men's basketball program is entering Year 2 under head coach Nate Oats, who led Alabama to a 16-15 (8-10 SEC) record in 2019-20 before the season was cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic. Alabama returns seven players from last year's team, including three players that missed the entire season, and signed five newcomers. It also lost one departing senior, one player to the NBA draft and three players to transfer. The Tide is still awaiting a decision on senior guard John Petty in regards to the 2020 NBA Draft.

Speaking of waiting, further renovations to Coleman Coliseum won't occur until Phase 2 of the Crimson Standard. However, assistant coach Bryan Hodgson isn't worried about that.

"The thing I love most about Alabama basketball is we have everything we need here to win," Hodgson said. "People are constantly asking, 'When are we going to redo Coleman Coliseum? When are we going to do this?' All that stuff's great, but I promise you, we have everything here that we need to win at Alabama, and the people are so passionate that when we really get this thing going, the glimpse that we got to see of the atmosphere against LSU, the atmosphere against Auburn, I'm excited for that to happen for every single home game.

"The passion that the people from this state have for Alabama athletics is unmatched. I had heard about it before taking this job, but getting to see it firsthand -- jumping on an airplane to go recruit with an Alabama shirt on and people recognizing me and yelling 'Roll Tide' from the back of the plane, that's something you don't get, really, at any other school in the country."

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Besides JQ and Shack, the entire roster is 6'6" and up isn't it?

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Alabama basketball officially announced the signing of four-star power forward Alex Tchikou on Monday afternoon. The 6-foot-11, 210-pounder committed to the Crimson Tide Sunday afternoon, choosing Alabama over offers from Arizona, Florida State, Mississippi State, Oregon and USC.

Tchikou, a native of Paris, France, recently reclassified to the 2020 class. He is rated as the No. 36 overall player and No. 6 power forward in the nation. He is the fifth member of Alabama’s 2020 class which sits at No. 9 overall in the Rivals team rankings.

Alabama’s 2020 recruiting haul includes four four-stars in Tchikou, Josh Primo, Keon Ambrose-Hylton, and Darius Miles as well as three-star JUCO transfer Keon Ellis. The Crimson TIde also added Yale graduate transfer Jordan Bruner.

Here’s a full look at Alabama’s 2020 class.

Alex Tchikou | 6-foot-11, 210 pounds | forward | freshman
Highlights

— Four-star prospect

— Athletic with size and length and someone who is active on both the offensive and defensive ends of the floor

— Played one year at Dream City Christian High School in Glendale, Ariz., under head coach Kyle Weaver, where he averaged nearly 16.0 points, 9.0 rebounds and 4.0 blocks per game

Quote from Nate Oats:"Alex is exactly the type of frontcourt player we're looking for in our system," Oats said. "He's long and athletic with guard skills. He can shoot and play on the perimeter as a 6-11 wing while also adding rebounding and shot-blocking in the paint. Alex's attitude and work ethic is outstanding and he has shown tremendous improvement in the past year. Alex has great upside and we're confident he will fit in perfect with the gym rats we currently have in our program."

Josh Primo | 6-foot-6, 180 pounds | guard | freshman
Highlights

— Four-star prospect

— Reclassified from a 2021 recruit to the class of 2020 after completing his prep requirements early from Royal Crown International

— Was the youngest player on Team Canada for the 2019 FIBA U-19 World Cup where he averaged 11.2 minutes and 4.2 points per game across his six games

Quote from Nate Oats: "Josh gives us that other ball-handler in the backcourt to play alongside our other guards. His size at the guard position allows us to play multiple guards on the floor together as we like to do. He's a big-time gym rat that's shown great improvement even here recently. His play in February showed he's ready to immediately contribute heavily for us as we compete for an SEC title. We love Josh's overall versatility, play-making ability, shooting and his experience playing on Canadian national teams. He's a proven competitor on both ends of the floor on an international level of play."

Keon Ambrose-Hylton | 6-foot-8, 200 pounds | forward | freshman
Highlights

— No. 102 player overall, No. 21 power forward

— Averaged 4.2 points and 1.7 rebounds over six games for Team Canada during the FIBA U19 World Cup

— Averaged 20.2 points, 7.2 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 2.8 steals per game in Peach Jam Invitational

Quote from Nate Oats: "Keon is a long, athletic skilled wing player that is capable of playing multiple positions on the floor," Oats said. "He's a gym rat that has significantly improved his skill level in the last couple years and we anticipate that to continue. He's a terrific young man with high character that's going to add a lot to our culture we're building here. We've thoroughly enjoyed getting to know him and his mother Michelle through the recruiting process. We are ecstatic that he is joining our family and can't wait to get him here as a part of the University of Alabama men's basketball program."

Darius Miles | 6-foot-7, 185 pounds | small forward | freshman
Highlights

— No. 113 player overall, No. 26 small forward

— Averaged 12.1 points and 2.5 rebounds per game on IMG’s postgraduate team

— Averaged 13.6 points, 5.7 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game for St. Charles High School in Washington, D.C., during the 2018-19 season

Quote from Nate Oats: "Darius has tremendous upside as a big wing that can play multiple positions. He's exceptionally skilled for his size on the perimeter. One of the best aspects of his game as I watched him was his passing ability from his position. His outlet passes and ability to handle the ball in the break will enable us to play even faster than what we had before. He has all the tools to be a great defender and rebounder as well. Playing his last year as a postgrad has given him a head start on what will be required of a freshman at a high major D-I level. We think once he's fully into our program he can contribute to our overall culture of winning up-tempo basketball and play multiple positions for us.”

Keon Ellis | 6-foot-6, 170 pounds | guard | junio
Highlights

— Four-star prospect

— Named a Second Team NJCAA All-American, averaging 18.7 points, 2.1 steals and 1.2 blocks per game while shooting 54 percent from the field and 40 percent from beyond the arc for Florida SouthWestern State College.

— His 562 points and 64 steals during his sophomore season are the most in a single season in school history

Quote from Nate Oats: "Keon is dynamic scorer that's proven he can score at a high-level while being efficient as well on offense. He plays the defensive side of the ball as well, being a long perimeter defender with quick instincts. While his offensive production has us really excited, we're equally excited for his defensive contributions he will provide as well. He's a proven winner having played on the top-ranked junior college team in the country this season. He led them in scoring while shooting over 40 percent from three-point range. He's exactly what we're looking for in a scoring guard in both our offensive and defensive systems."

Jordan Bruner | 6-foot-9, 205 pounds | forward | graduate
Highlights

— Named First Team All-Ivy League in 2020 after averaging 10.9 points per game and leading the conference with 9.2 rebounds per game. He also ranked third in blocks (1.7 bpg) and fourth in assists (3.8 apg).

— Became the first Yale player to ever post a triple-double when he had 14 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists in a victory at Cornell this past season.

— 2020 Academic All-Ivy

Quote from Nate Oats: "We felt like Jordan was the best grad transfer available this season based on what we needed. He provides us a big that impacts the game tremendously on both sides of the ball. Offensively, he's a big that is capable of being a playmaker on the perimeter while also providing a presence inside. His basketball IQ and overall skill level are exactly what we needed to put us in a position to contend on a nationally-relevant level. Defensively, he can provide rim protection, move well enough to switch and guard perimeter players, rebound the ball and then push the ball in the break to help our transition game. He's played in multiple NCAA tournaments and pushed Yale to unprecedented heights in his time there. We're looking for him to do the same in his year with us."

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"We were terrible on defense this year. Part of it was our injuries, part of it was I didn’t do a good job coaching it, part of it was our personnel — we wanted to play so many guards because of our offensive system, but we had on the floor sometimes Kira Lewis at 6-foot-3 or 6-foot-2, Beetle Bolden at 6-foot, Jaden Shackleford at 6-foot-2 and John Petty at 6-foot-5 playing the four. It’s not a recipe to being a great defensive team, with that little size on the floor in the SEC."

"We need to get bigger guards, bigger wings. We did that. So I think our defense will come up. Plus we’re going to spend a lot more time focusing on it."

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"The biggest thing is we needed to get bigger guards. We need to play multiple guards with our offensive system. We played the multiple guards last year — they were just too small. Now we’ve got (freshman) Josh Primo, as a 6-foot, 6-inch combo guard. We have (junior college transfer) Keon Ellis as a 6-foot, 5-inch two-guard. We have Darius Miles, a freshman who’s a 6-foot, 7-inch wing. We’ve got (grad transfer) Jordan Bruner, who is 6-foot-9 and really athletic and can switch everything. If you really want to be great on defense, you get guys who can guard multiple positions and you can switch more. We’re going to do more switching, we’re going to play bigger guards, we’re going to be a little bit more aggressive in our ball-screen coverage whether it’s with switches or get the offense reacting to us rather than us always reacting to the offense."

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Huge. Nate Oats and his assistant coach Bryan Hodgson completed major work this spring with some of the very best high school and transfer talent available. While there are sky-high expectations surrounding Josh Primo, top-40 forward Alex Tchikou could turn out to be the Crimson Tide's best addition.

There were some questions regarding how Oats would fair after jumping to the SEC after coaching in the MAC for several years, but a top-10 class and top graduate-transfer Jordan Bruner heading to Alabama is nothing short of impressive.

Oats should have a roster that can hold its own against anyone in the SEC next season.

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