Alabama's Nate Oats details call to Nick Saban that helped spark Final Four run
GLENDALE, Ariz. — A phone call from Alabama basketball coach Nate Oats to retired UA football coach Nick Saban had a hand in the Crimson Tide's remarkable NCAA Tournament run to the Final Four.
Oats, at least, is convinced of it.
Alabama entered the tournament on a downward spiral that bottomed out with an uninspired loss to Florida in UA's first SEC Tournament game. It was the Crimson Tide's fourth loss in its previous six games, and that's when Oats picked up the phone.
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"I talked to coach Saban after we lost in the SEC Tournament. I think just about every year he won the national championship, they lost at some point during the year. Football is obviously different, there are a lot more games in basketball. But this year, they lost the Texas game and he did an unbelievable job getting the season turned around. So I called him and said 'How to we get this thing turned around this late? We're not playing our best basketball,'" Oats said Thursday at a Final Four news conference at State Farm Arena. "He watches all the games. He said 'Coach, you've got to get your guys to (mentally) go to the next play.' We talked about that a little bit as a group."
Getting the taste of the Florida loss out of his team's mouth was certainly Oats' motivation for the call. He'd noted during UA's struggles that players were letting missed shots or other missed opportunities on offense affect their defense negatively. But Saban told Oats that the "move on" mentality works both ways, applying just the same when the team is winning handily.
"I think it's a great philosophy in life. ... You live in the past, you're not going to be very good in the present. So we've been trying to move to the next play, the next possession, the next timeout. Next, next, next, and our guys have done a pretty good job of that these last four games," Oats added.
Next for UA, of course, is a national semifinal game against No. 1 overall seed UConn on Saturday night.
Tuscaloosa News columnist Chase Goodbread is also the weekly co-host of Crimson Cover TV on WVUA-23. Reach him at cgoodbread@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter @chasegoodbread.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Alabama's Nate Oats details call to Nick Saban that helped Final Four run
