I've read quite a bit about Bama basketball this week and some of the beatdown has been kind of hard to swallow. I will say that I've been kind of hard on them at times for the lack of production from their offense but maybe there are some reasons for the lack of consistency of the team this year.
We'll start from the beginning and maybe I can shed some light on why I think they didn't reach their goal this year. Personally I think it all started from last years team. Bama lost three players from that team that could have made all the difference in the world for them this year.
Mitchell was kicked off the team, Hankerson transferred for some reason, and Eblen decided not to play the extra year that he had. Mitchell, an All-American, was the main key to this team this year because he owned the baseline and anything around the goal and that is where Bama hurt the most this year. Hankerson gave the club some very good minutes off the bench, he had a decent shot from the outside. Eblen couldn't shoot a lick, but he could sure play defense.
Now let's look at what happened this year. The only senior on the team, Steele, gets hurt immediately and misses an extensive amount of games. Jacobs came in hurt and never had many quality minutes until the last few games of the season. Lacey goes down with an injury and misses some games, Releford goes down with an injury and misses some games, and Engstrom goes down with a knee injury and is lost for the season. Pollard was being counted on heavily but he showed immediatly that he needed some work and would not be a force on the team this year. Gueye is only a body on the floor playing hard but has very few skills to help the team.
I am really surprised they won as many games as they did but I am also surprised they didn't win even more games as well. There were some conference games that they let get away from them that could have made a big difference in their post season play but I can't be mad at them for losing them though, only disappointed. Now I might be mad about the Auburn game.
How good could this team have been had they had the other 3 players? I say they could have been a much better team than they were but what happened to those three are just bad breaks that go along with sports. This team played their hearts out for the most part but just came up short and I can't turn my back on them.
I'll be there Tuesday night cheering for them as though they were in the Big Dance, and I'll be there next season cheering them on in hopes of making it to the Big Dance. They have won twenty or more games the past three seasons, that is much more than they were winning before CAG came to Bama. There are brighter days ahead for this team. ROLL TIDE!!!!