re: Wednesday SEC Basketball - Shooty Hoops

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Same, we lost our best shooter (Wrightsell) earlier in the year, and since that time it seems like half the team has slowly gotten banged-up with "undisclosed."

Omoruyi is a GTD tonight, and guys like Philon, Reid, and Dioubate just show up with a boot or brace during the week and randomly don't get any minutes.

This conference slate has been brutal.

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The Wrightsell injury really hurt Bama (and was compounded by Mallette who was going to share minutes with him also missing the season).

It really shows up against the better defensive teams like Auburn and Ole Miss. He was the most consistent 3 point shooter and opened up the space for Sears and a good defender that Oats could play with any group of players.


Without him (or Mallette) you get the feeling that Oats constantly has a defense OR offense choice to make against the best teams.

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when your only other experienced guard is in the process of disappearing (Sears).

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Sears' struggles, in my opinion, this year is simply that he's not really a true point guard. Last 2 seasons Alabama had an experienced point guard and although Sears had the ball a lot he wasn't the main facilitator off the dribble.

Add Wrightsell being out and that often means a lineup missing one extra 40%+ 3 pt shooter to stretch defenses and Sears forced into being the primary facilitator.

Alabama's ceiling this season depends on the Freshman Philon giving them 25+ consistent minutes running the offense where Sears can play off the ball like in the past. Catch and shoot or drive.

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I thought the intentions were to redshirt Mallette this season, but when Wrightsell got injured they made the decision to take the redshirt off of Mallette? Wrightsell was hurt during the Oregon game, and Mallette recorded no minutes until the game against UNC (first game after the Wrightsell injury).

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Mallette had knee issues the entire offseason, meaning he missed most of the conditioning and practice. He worked his way back into practice shape and was practicing consistently early in the year but due to the offseason stuff he was going to go ahead and redshirt. However about the time he really was able to get 3-4 weeks of good practice in Wrightsell got hurt, so he was prepared to play. However, his knees started bothering him again pretty soon after and they had to halt basketball activity, so he was going to have to ramp back up again mid-season and even then you didn't know if his knees would pop back up as an issue. He averaged 10.5 mins per game in December, but he only played 5 total minutes in the first two conference games and they sidelined him after that. They just decided it wasn't worth it to press it and maybe waste his last eligible season, so they decided to sit him for the rest of the year and get a medical redshirt.

I just remember some early broadcasts and talk from reporters and such that Mallette was going to be redshirted early in the season.

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I thought Derrion Reid was going to be a lot better for Alabama. Is he falling out of the rotation?

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Also been hurt for the majority of SEC play with hamstring issues. Has either been questionable or out on every injury report since A&M. Thought he was ok for Georgia, tweaked again. Thought he was ok for Auburn, tweaked again. Now it sounds like he's out for a bit, maybe the rest of the regular season.

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“So Derrion had the hamstring deal, and it’s one of those things where you don’t want to bring him back too early,” Oats said. “We thought we rested him long enough, but it kind of flared up again after (Auburn). He played limited minutes against Auburn, but he’s been our of practice.

“We’re checking, he’s getting a second MRI, actually the third one in the last few weeks. I think he’ll be listed as doubtful (against Missouri) based on not practicing yesterday and today. Hopefully the MRI shows up clean, maybe all the swelling or the inflammation, whatever it is, hopefully he can go.”

“Derrion’s one of our best positional size, athletic defenders. And he’s done very good jobs on different guys when he’s been healthy,” Oats said. “It would be great to have him. … It’s hard not getting the reps, and he’s missed maybe 35, 36 percent of our practice reps this year.

“I think he’s going to be a pro. He came in as a McDonald’s All-American, he’s got all the intangibles as far as tough, great attitude, high IQ, he’s athletic. A lot of the stuff the pros are looking for. We really don’t want to hurt his long-term career by rushing something to win a game or two. We’re trying to do what’s right by him.”

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Yep, that was the initial plan once he had issues in the summer. He wanted to get a full year at full strength here (especially with the roster make up the way it was) rather than piecemeal it. Then Latrell got hurt and he came to Oats and told him he was willing to take off the redshirt to fill in for Trelly, did so for a few weeks, then started having his issues again.

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I thought that was it, but the talk earlier in the thread about Wrightsell and him splitting minutes had me thinking I had imagined it. I didn't think that was ever the plan going into the season.

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Arkansas +16.5 is the bet of the week

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Don’t see us winning but you got to figure Auburn will be completely uninterested in this game.

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Sears' struggles, in my opinion, this year is simply that he's not really a true point guard. Last 2 seasons Alabama had an experienced point guard and although Sears had the ball a lot he wasn't the main facilitator off the dribble. Add Wrightsell being out and that often means a lineup missing one extra 40%+ 3 pt shooter to stretch defenses and Sears forced into being the primary facilitator. Alabama's ceiling this season depends on the Freshman Philon giving them 25+ consistent minutes running the offense where Sears can play off the ball like in the past. Catch and shoot or drive.

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Yeah, Bama has TO issues for sure, and I guess PG is a big part of that.

Bama is a terrible 335th in D1 in TO margin at -3.0. Missouri is 17th at +3.9. And Bama commits an average of 13.2 TOs per game -- or 285th.

So I'm sure Gates will be applying lots of pressure to get TOs and fast break points off those TOs. We shall see!

AG Andy Bailey in the house at D Rowe’s.