MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) -A pair of one-point losses, a blown 23-point lead and a visit to the hostile territory of No. 3 Kentucky.
Yep, it’s been an adventure-packed two weeks for coach Anthony Grant and Alabama.
The coach who has known little but success during his career as a Florida assistant and Virginia Commonwealth head man has endured plenty of trials during Year 1 of a rebuilding process with the Crimson Tide (13-11, 3-7 Southeastern Conference).
The current four-game losing streak has been a nice synopsis for the experience.
Alabama followed one-point losses to No. 22 Vanderbilt (65-64) and Auburn (58-57) with an even more exasperating defeat against Mississippi. The Tide led the Rebels by 23 points a minute into the second half only to lose by seven.
All that makes Tuesday night’s 66-55 loss at Kentucky seem almost comforting for Grant, because he felt his team competed hard until the end. He didn’t feel the same way about the Ole Miss game.
cially for an inexperienced basketball team,” he said. “We didn’t handle it very well. The thing I was most upset about, or probably perplexed about, was our inability to compete.”
He had a similar take after the Ole Miss game, questioning his team’s “character, substance, toughness, will and passion.”
Grant certainly doesn’t take losing easily. He was on Billy Donovan’s Gators staff for eight consecutive NCAA tournament teams. Then, Grant led VCU to two tournaments in three seasons and won 86.3 percent of his league games.
The Tide seems destined for its third straight losing SEC mark, and barring a surprising league tournament title run and automatic berth, its third year in a row without making the NCAA field.
“He takes (losses) real tough. Coach Grant hates to lose,” sophomore forward JaMychal Green said. “We all do. It’s something that he can’t deal with, something he wouldn’t want to deal with.”
Grant had little time to mold his first recruiting class after his hiring, and injury problems have taken a toll. He has been forced to use three of the four newcomers as at least part-time starters and all four log significant minutes.
against No. 6 Purdue, No. 9 Kansas State and Florida State.
“It’s been a very tough transition for us,” said Green, one of the team’s few highly recruited players. “We’ve played a lot of tough teams but we’ve lost by one point, two points. They weren’t any blowouts. They were very winnable games, but we just didn’t finish them. We learned from them.”
The most consistent players have been Green and senior Mikhail Torrance, whose 15 points a game and 131 assists lead the team. Green is averaging 14.5 points and 7.0 rebounds.
Nobody else is scoring in double figures. Alabama ranks last in the league in rebounding and 11th in scoring.
Grant is seeking more consistency from a team struggling to finish out games. The Tide plays SEC West-leading Arkansas on Saturday.
“For us it’s the same as it’s been from Day One,” he said. “We understand that we don’t have a very high margin of error. We’ve lost some very close ball games and have lost four in a row. The thing that we’ve got to do is understand that it’s never as good as it seems and it’s never as bad as it seems.
“We don’t live and die in moments, it’s not a one-game season. We talk all year long about consistency and that’s what we’re trying to develop.”
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