Alabama Basketball: Takeaways from Tide’s upset win over unbeaten Auburn

3. Alabama is Better than they Look

As I mentioned earlier, Alabama held a record of 9-7 with five of those losses coming by single-digits. Of those five losses, the Crimson Tide probably should have come away with wins in two of those games, against Florida and against Penn.

Against Florida, Alabama led by 21 before letting the Gators back into the game, only to lose in double-overtime. Against Penn, Alabama was down one and was sent to the free-throw line as time expired with a chance to tie up the game or even take the lead and unfortunately Kira Lewis missed both free throws.

What this means is that had it been for one play going differently in each of these games, Alabama could have at worst, a record of 11-5 and that isn’t even mentioning their two-point loss in Happy Valley against Penn State.

Not only that but just ask John Calipari how he feels about the Crimson Tide:

Alabama lost by nine points In Lexington to the Wildcats, but it was a lot closer than the box score would suggest. The Crimson Tide played a great game for about 39 minutes before letting Kentucky pull away in the final  70 seconds.

With only 1:01 remaining in the game, Alabama trailed 71-67, but Kentucky hit a three with a little under a minute to go and because of it, the Tide went onto lose 76-67.

So even though Alabama lost by nine, they played a good game against a very good Kentucky team and because of it, Alabama put themselves on the map.

Then Wednesday came around and the Crimson Tide put the nation on notice. A 15-0 Auburn team traveled to Tuscaloosa to take on the 8-7 Crimson Tide and to the surprise of everyone with the exception of Bama fans, Alabama won and they did it handily.

If this doesn’t tell you Alabama is a high-quality team who is better than your record, I’m not quite sure what will.