Alabama basketball braces for rematch with No. 1 Houston, and why it's only the beginning
After notching two wins in three games against Michigan State, UConn and then-No. 1 North Carolina in the Phil Knight Invitational, the Alabama basketball team now faces a similarly tough three-game stretch beginning Saturday (2 p.m. CT, ABC) on the road against the new No. 1 team, Houston. Following that, UA will play Memphis at home and 18th-ranked Gonzaga in Birmingham, and coach Nate Oats expects it to be every bit as telling as the Knight tournament.
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"I like this stretch we've got. It'll show a lot about our team. Starting Saturday for the next eight days will really show where we're at, what areas we need to improve on, whether we win or lose. This game Saturday, we're going to compete as hard as we can to win, they're No. 1 in the country. It'd be a huge win for us on the road," Oats said. "If you don't win the game, how far have we come since the UConn game? How far have we come from the Carolina game? How much further do we have to go? Even if we win, they're going to expose some new areas and hopefully, we've got a mature enough group to learn from both wins and losses."
Alabama (7-1) is ranked No. 8 in the latest AP poll with a budding star in freshman Brandon Miller, a deep bench, and an emphasis on defense that was absent last season when the Crimson Tide sputtered toward the end of the SEC schedule and was ousted in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Miller leads the team in scoring (20.2 points per game) and is second in rebounding at 9.2 per game. Against Houston, the UA defense will be tasked with stopping star guard Marcus Sasser, who is scoring 17 a game on average.
"He's an elite shooter. He can create his own shot; he doesn't need a teammate to get him open," Oats said. "... He's quick. He goes by people if you try to put length on him. He's able to get in the paint, and that's a major issue with these guys. If you give up blow-bys and you get in defensive rotations, then they just crush you on the (offensive) boards."
Alabama beat Houston 83-82 in Tuscaloosa last year in a thriller, in which Sasser scored a game-high 25. Despite having only a few returning players who were involved in it, Oats has shown his team video of last year's game, in which the Cougars outrebounded Alabama 21-7 on the offensive glass. Oats said he'll be glad for the time to prepare for follow-up contests against Memphis and Gonzaga, which the Knight tournament schedule didn't allow for.
"This more like a gauntlet you'd be facing in the SEC where you get a Kentucky, a Tennessee, an Arkansas back to back, but you've got a couple extra days in between them all to prepare for them, so that's the difference between that Michigan State-UConn-UNC (stretch)," Oats added. "We've had a week to prep for Houston, three days going into Memphis, another three days or whatever going into Gonzaga. We'll have more time to prep. The games will be just as tough, but hopefully, we'll be a little more fresh."
Reach Chase Goodbread at cgoodbread@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter @chasegoodbread.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Alabama basketball schedule: No. 1 Houston begins difficult stretch
