For the fourth time in five years, Alabama head coach Nate Oats has his program in the Sweet 16 with a real chance to make the Final Four for a second straight season. On Thursday night, Alabama will face No. 6 seed BYU, with an Elite Eight birth on the line.<\/p>\n
After facing a St. Mary\u2019s team in the Round of 32 that plays with one of the slowest tempos in the country, the Crimson Tide will face a Cougars side that plays much more like what Oats is used to.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know that I want to say it\u2019s refreshing to go against somebody that plays like us, because I think we\u2019re really tough to guard,\u201d Oats said. \u201cWe\u2019ve led the country in scoring the last two years. I don\u2019t think anybody\u2019s saying it\u2019s refreshing to play Alabama, whoever\u2019s running the defense for the other team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oats also mentioned the type of physicality that will be displayed while also praising BYU\u2019s electric offense.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe it\u2019s not such a Smash Mouth game, like not playing football out there, like some of these teams,\u201d Oats said. \u201cBut they\u2019re not easy to cover. Like, I mean, he\u2019s (BYU head coach Kevin Young) running great sets. They\u2019ve got shooters all over the place…So we\u2019re gonna have to really lock in, and coaches are gonna have to really do a good job getting our guys ready, and our guys are gonna have to execute whatever the plan is that we decide to put in, and we\u2019re gonna have to make adjustments to it, because I\u2019m sure he\u2019ll make adjustments.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oats is excited about the opportunity and the challenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m looking forward to playing in the Sweet 16,\u201d Oats said. \u201cFirst time in school history we\u2019ve been to three straight sweet sixteens. But I would not use the word refreshing to play against an offense like BYU has. It\u2019s probably not the correct word.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For the fourth time in five years, Alabama head coach Nate Oats has his program in the Sweet 16 with a real chance to make the Final Four for a second straight season. On Thursday night, Alabama will face No. 6 seed BYU, with an Elite Eight birth on the line. After facing a St. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28607,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1869],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-byu"],"yoast_head":"\n