Alabama fell 98-88 to the Georgia Bulldogs on Tuesday night in Athens. The loss followed a familiar script from too many defeats this season: getting beat on the boards and on the defensive end.

Nate Oats preaches defense over and over again and talks about the fact that more so than anything else, it’s an effort related thing and for whatever reason, his teams have struggled with it over the last couple of years.

After the game — which sets up a season finale against the Auburn Tigers at Coleman Coliseum this weekend before the SEC Tournament — Oats ripped his team a bit and almost seemed to be sending them a message that this effort won’t be good enough in the month of March.

“It needs to be a wake up call,” Oats said. “If you have a slow start and you have guys that aren’t locked in and ready to play on both sides of the ball and don’t attack the rim and don’t play strong on offense and don’t get stops or box out or rebound on defense it’s gonna be hard to win.”

Oats talked about the fact that the team is coming off a huge win at Tennessee with also Auburn on deck and how this might have played a factor, but that this is not an acceptable way to approach things.

“If you can’t turn around from a tough mentally, physically exhausting game on Saturday and have yourself mentally ready to go on Tuesday, then we’ve got a lot of growing up to do.”

The team had better do that growing up quickly with the postseason upon them, and also a chance to potentially end a hated rival’s season who will be desperate for a victory as well.

Time will tell if they are able to get things fixed.