Nate Oats: SEC title, NCAA tournament is motivation, not chasing No. 1 ranking

Eyebrows raised this week when Purdue came in at No. 1 over Alabama in the AP Top 25. The Crimson Tide has gained plenty of support to be the nation’s top team as it remains undefeated in SEC play heading into Saturday’s SEC/Big 12 Challenge.

But head coach Nate Oats isn’t worried about being atop the rankings. He knows where his focus is.

Oats said despite his team’s success this year, the goal remains the same. He wants the Crimson Tide to focus on improving every day in order to compete for a league title and, eventually, a national championship. The rankings aren’t a big focus at the moment.

“You know what? We haven’t yet,” Oats said of whether they’ve used the rankings as a motivator. “I don’t know if the guys want it that bad. I haven’t really asked them. To me, you just take care of business and let all that stuff kind of fall where it falls. To me, right now, with our players, our motivation’s to try to get better every game. We’re trying to play for an SEC Championship, we’re trying to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament. In order to do that, you’ve got to get better every game. You want to be peaking in March. To me, that’s what we’ve been preaching [to] our guys.

“We had gotten better up until the last game. I thought we took a big dive last game. We’ve got to flip this thing around and make a big jump forward this next game because I felt like we went backwards last game.”

Nate Oats says SEC/Big 12 challenge is important to SEC

Nate Oats stated how big the SEC/Big 12 challenge was to Alabama and the conference as a whole.

The latest edition pitted Alabama against Oklahoma in a non-conference tilt. The No. 2 Crimson Tide did not want to overlook the Sooners and Oats said it was important for Alabama to get the win Saturday.

Simply put, the Crimson Tide have an intriguing game on tap.

“Looking forward to the Big 12 challenge,” Oats said. “I think it’s a big deal for the SEC to play well on this. You know, it’s kind of in the middle of the conference (schedule) and most teams are playing within the conference. So I guess, it’s big for the SEC to do well. We’re going to try to do our part in it. Not an easy game on the road at Oklahoma. I mean … I think they’ve lost four  one-possession games. So they’re playing teams really tough. Texas, Kansas, Baylor, you know, they’ve just lost some one possession games. 

“So our guys gotta understand as a team, they are more than capable of playing with the best teams in the country. We know that, we’re prepping our guys for it. We got to be much improved from the Mississippi State game. I don’t think we were very good in that game at all on Wednesday, but I think our guys will be (ready).

“I think they, hopefully, got a little bit of a wake up call that we got to come prepared a little better and come focused a little better. Play harder to start the game. So, looking forward to seeing our guys respond after the Wednesday game.”