The Alabama Crimson Tide men’s basketball team suffered their first defeat in conference play on Tuesday night when the Ole Miss Rebels came into Coleman Coliseum and left with a 74-64 victory.

Effort for the Tide looked like a concern especially in the first half with the team not even looking ready to play. For the game, Alabama turned the ball over a staggering 21 times, an unacceptable number for a team hoping to win a ton of games.

Having made a habit of securing offensive rebounds thus far this season, Nate Oats’ squad was dominated on the offensive glass and pulled down just four rebounds on offense the entire night. After the loss, Oats did not mince words when asked about the way his team came out and started the game.

"It's disgusting, to be honest with you. With the amount of 5th year seniors we have and the leadership that should be shown on this team, to have guys not come in ready to play. It starts with me…" – Nate Oats on Alabama's lack of effort in the home loss to Ole Miss pic.twitter.com/hfJ26NnFS3

— The Next Round (@NextRoundLive) January 15, 2025

“It’s disgusting, to be honest with you. With the amount of 5th year seniors we have and the leadership that should be shown on this team, to have guys not come in ready to play,” Oats said. “Look, it starts with me because I’m supposed to be the one motivating these guys and I obviously didn’t motivate them very well to make sure they’re ready.”

“I’m gonna have to look in the mirror to see what I did and didn’t do, have a good talk with some of these seniors who are supposed to be our leaders and figure out why we weren’t ready…but it’s very disappointing, frustrating, disgusting.”

Oats went on to credit Ole Miss and say his team lost to a good team — but felt there was a very specific reason why they lost.

“It’s not like we lost to a bad team, this is a really good team…but we didn’t lose because they were a far superior team tonight, I felt like we lost because they came ready to play, they brought energy, they brought effort, and we did not. It’s a frustrating way to lose.”

Oats’ squad will have another huge test and a chance to fix things this weekend with a road game against top-ten Kentucky on Saturday afternoon in Lexington.