Nate Oats Praises Holloway’s 16-Point Double-Double in Mississippi State Win

Alabama's head basketball coach, Nate Oats, spoke to the media following Alabama's dominating 100-75 win over Mississippi State on Wednesday night, where he praised his junior guard Aden Holloway, who had an explosive night facilitating the ball around in the Crimson Tide's win.

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Holloway who took over the point guard spot which is normally a spot that Alabama sophomore guard Labaron Philon commands, but due to Philon being out tonight with a nagging leg/groin injury the Charlotte native had to step up and that's exactly what he did with Holloway recording a 16-point double double in Wednesday win which saw him match his career high of assists at ten.

The Junior guard who started his career in Auburn, but transfered to the Tide following his Freshman season in 2024 had a fantastic night which saw him lead the charge in fascilatating the basketball in Alabama's 25-point win which saw the Crimson TIde make a barrage of threes tying it's season high of 22 which was set on december 29th in Alabama's 102-78 win against Yale which coincidentally Philon also missed that game.

Oats shared his thoughts on Holloway's performance, fascinating the ball tonight, and said he thinks the Junior guard's physicality is the biggest factor in getting into the paint, which forces defenses to collapse and allows Holloway to find his guys open beyond the arc.

"He gets in the paint, I think his physicality on his drives are significantly better, you know teams that don't want to give up threes are just built out and are leaving the paint open while he gets in there and their kind of natural reaction is to collapse, and he was able to find some bigs, you know he was good."

Oats did pick on Holloway for his turnovers, but did reassure the media that turning the ball over is something that is uncharacteristically from a guy like Holloway who only averages 1.5 turnovers per game, but tonight did see him turn the ball over four times with three of those coming in the first half, but Holloway did make up for it with six first half assists.

"Outside of the turnovers, he (Holloway) was really good, and you know he's frustrated with himself with some of the turnovers, but he'll get those cleaned up, he's not a guy that usually turns it over, I mean, he doesnt average hardly very many turnovers on the year, so he'll get those cleaned up."

It's still unknwn if Philon will bein the lineup come Saturday for the Crimson Tide's matchup against Tennessee in Knoxville, but one things for sure and that's that Holloway will be ready to jump back in the point guard spot and try to recreate his performance from tonight with Alabama looking to avenge it's 79-73 loss to the Volunteers in Coleman Coliesum back on January 24th this Saturday Feburary 28th with tip-off scheduled for 5 p.m.

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