TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Alabama’s No. 2 basketball program continues its season Friday night by hosting former Crimson Tide assistant and now second-year Arkansas State head coach Bryan Hodgson, at Coleman Coliseum for the second game of the year for both. programs.

The Crimson Tide entered the season with huge expectations as head coach Nate Oats regularly preached his goal of being the first team to win a national college basketball championship. Oats was consistent throughout the summer that to make it to San Antonio, the program needed to embrace the defensive end of the field.

Alabama performed well defensively in the season opener against UNC-Asheville holding the Bulldogs to just 0.75 points per possession. This effort puts the Crimson Tide in the top 25 in defensive efficiency to open the year, so where can the team look to improve over the next two games?

“You know what? Our defensive effort was great,” Oats said Thursday. “That’s the baseline, you have to put effort in every day. So that’s where it needs to be. I think you saw some of the rim protection, Cliff (Omoruyi) had some good blocks Monday They will, Arkansas State We’ll probably do a better job, maybe trying to get him off the rim, but we’re still going to get him to the rim as often as possible and try to protect the rim. , but we also had guards that, Labaron (Philon) had two blocks. I think we have tougher, more physical guards that keep the ball out of the lane.

“I think there are areas to improve, we only had one real match, but during the exhibition we have to be able to be tough, physical without committing any fouls. We committed too many of fouls in the Memphis game I think you were able to do it on every possession and regardless of the score I think it’s just establishing that mindset and that’s kind of it. what we’re working on. So far I don’t see any gaping holes in our defense, but there are just a lot of little things. Our defensive rebounding needs to improve. and Arkansas State is really going to emphasize their offensive rebounding. This is an elite team that Bryan coached. He was here with us. He was kind of in charge of offensive rebounding. , so he’s paying attention to that and these guys are going really hard. We’re going to have to do a better job boxing out and guarding. remove them from the glass. That would probably be the biggest concern I have against Arkansas State on the defensive end. There are other things, they have good shooters. We can’t let their shooters get away with this. They have tough, physical downhill drivers and we have to do a good job of keeping them out of the paint, but offensive rebounding is an area where they can really hurt you and we haven’t been good yet in this area. we need to do much better than that.

Alabama beat Arkansas State 89-65 last season, but Hodgson brings a team to Tuscaloosa that looks much more like his vision because he used the transfer portal to improve. The Crimson Tide allowed 14 offensive rebounds to UNC-Asheville on Monday night, leading to 12 second-chance points. Boxing out and clearing the defensive glass is the next step for Alabama to take in becoming an elite defensive team.