CECIL HURT: UA is improved over January

For a half, it was the Alabama basketball team that its fans have been wanting to see all year.

For the next half, it was the Alabama basketball team that fans have grown accustomed to seeing.

It’s no disgrace to come into the O’Connell Center and be tied with No. 1 Florida with less than five minutes to play. It’s no disgrace -- but it is also no victory. Alabama has now dropped two games in a row, and has two extremely difficult teams to contend with next in Tennessee and Kentucky.

No team is going to come into Gainesville and beat Florida this season, but Alabama had its chances. Some of those actually slipped away in the first half. The Crimson Tide was up by 11 points at halftime, but it could have been more. There were at least three missed layups in the half and as many open 3-point looks that didn’t go down.

Very few of those opportunities existed in the second half. As Florida became more and more efficient in running its offense, Alabama was faced consistently with the prospect of breaking the press, then trying to execute its offense. Sometimes, it worked. Most of the time, it didn’t. Alabama scored just 25 points in the second half and just three in the final 4:27 of the game.

“Our offense in the first half really came from our defense," said Alabama point guard Ronald Steele. “We made a lot of stops and we were able to push the ball down the court. When you are taking the ball out of the net every time, it’s a lot tougher. It was hard for us to score in our half-court set."

That was all part of Florida “imposing its will," as Tide head coach Mark Gottfried described it. What was frustrating, for the second straight game, was that Alabama couldn’t fight that off and gather itself in the final five minutes. It’s a little more understandable when it happens against Florida than it is when it happens against Ole Miss, which it did last Saturday. But in both cases, Alabama put itself in a position to steal a road win -- only to fade in the final five minutes.

At this point, Alabama isn’t going to get dramatically better on offense.

The Crimson Tide has some scoring assets, but not enough. There isn’t a consistent perimeter game. But Alabama can continue to improve on defense, and help its offense in that way.

On Wednesday, it wasn’t enough. Down the stretch of the season, it might let Alabama fight its way into the NCAA Tournament.

“I could really see the last three games that they have really turned the corner," said Florida coach Billy Donovan when asked about Alabama.

“To me, they’re playing like a Top 10 team. They sort of overwhelmed us in the first half."

That might be the kind words of a coach trying to explain an uncharacteristic first half, but Donovan’s analysis seems generally accurate. Gottfried made the same observation. The Tide is playing better basketball than it played for most of January. In the last three road games, it has played exemplary road basketball -- for 35 minutes or so. In January, it wasn’t playing well on the road for three minutes per game, much less 35.

But 35 minutes isn’t 40 minutes, which is what is required on the road in the SEC.

There is still hope for this Alabama basketball team. The first half against Florida showed the basis for that hope. But it will only mean something if Wednesday’s loss is used as a building block – not hailed as an accomplishment in itself.

Cecil Hurt is sports editor of the Tuscaloosa News. Reach him at

cecil.hurt@tuscaloosanews.com or 205-722-0225