I hear he had the boys at Romulus High School really competing 2002-2013

Best player and 2 others have entered the transfer portal

Maybe they should have went after Roy Williams or Coach K. Heck, I bet Bobby Knight would come out of retirement for that job.

Oates was going to be on several schools short list and time will tell if he's as good as the pundits think he is. His success will depend directly on how committed Alabama is to basketball. To this point it hasn't been a priority, it seems.

There can be some serious conflicts of culture in hiring a yankee to work at bama. I worked for a young gun superstar professor at Auburn from Syracuse New York. He was and is to this day the most arrogant rude ass I have ever met. Hopefully Oates is great..

He would have taken the Troy job to get the hell out of Buffalo. He can now sell the snow shovel and blower.

Basketball can turn a profit but the conference needs each other. Its approx 1.7 per win plus 1.7 per team getting in the tourney. So with 4 teams to sweet 16 thats 7 teams x 1.7 + 8 x 1.7 = approx 25 million for conference.

Hey jawbone! Excuse the sanctimony but this thread was started by a barner. With barners commenting in it.

Saban and Oates!!!!! Gonna be sharing and Oates-meal cream pie for breakfast every day. Huge hire!!!!

Of the 4 that entered the transfer portal, 2 have fouled out already and the other 2 are 2/9 on free throws so far. All 2019-2020 home games will be played inside the transfer portal until Coleman Coliseum upgrades are complete....RTR

My guess is Bama hired him and then pushes for the coach at Mountain Brook as an assistant, who also just happens to have a 5* that hasn't signed yet and several more in the pipeline. Good thing about a guy who coached at a high school level is he has to develop talent, it just isn't great recruiting. Same way at Buffalo, not a house hold name and he has to develop kids to be competitive. Hopefully at Bama he will have some talent to go with development..

Also with all the FBI stuff going on Bama probably wanted to make sure they got a guy who isn't tied to it in any way.... Bama don't hire cheaters

If a former NBA coach didn’t improve Bama basketball, What do y’all think a former high school coach will do? Seems a bit illogical to believe this is an improvement.

Let em have their fun Reb. They’ll still suck in the end

Exactly. Just look at Auburn football with high school gus. And like 257 said they still suck. You agree right?

I agree. This isn't an upgrade of any sort and has caused multiple players to leave. The basketball roster is now gutted with another "up and coming" coach who's longest stint is as a coach in High School. In the coming days the recruiting class will most likely fall apart and Alabama's starting lineup next year on opening day will probably be three walk ons, and some bench players from this season. As bad as it was it's going to be much worse. Good job Byrne.


Trendon Watford? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAA...... that kid can go pretty much anywhere he wants but he's going to go to Alabama and jump on that train wreck? Nah.

Bama Basketball isn't going to be a quick turn by any means, neither was Auburn. Took Pearl 3 years to really get it going.

I imagine he's spending his first day in Tuscaloosa begging 19 year olds to stick around.

I sure hope Kira stays

Meh, Bruce Pearl is from Boston, Mass. Hard to get too much more Yankee than that and he’s seemed to do quite well. Rick Pitino from NY, NY once at UK comes to mind. Billy Donavan who grew up in NY state as we’ll won 2 titles at Florida. I do get what your saying but there are many who can break the barrier. I’m not really excited about the hire but crossing my fingers that in 4 years, yes it will take a least 3 but I’ll allow 4, that we will hopefully make the list of 64 in March. Bama basketball has reminded me of Tn football. Was once a great SEC program and has slid into mediocrity over the last 20 years. Hopefully this Nate Yankee guy can talk some sense in the powers that be and burn Coleman to the ground. Build a state of the art basketball arena. If you build it they will come.

Gotta look at the stats...guy really knows how to coach and has won at every level so far...I think he is a diamond in the rough and trust Byrne (especially after the baseball hire where bama without anywhere near the talent beat Auburn and is a scrappy team)...I mean all of the top coaches had to start somewhere...Anything is better than being the bubble team we have been that is boring and frustrating to watch! I would at least like to either suck bad or be good but not get my hopes up and then crush them everytime lol

I'd be tickled to see them hit more than 50% of their free throws, I mean 4 and 5* kids can't hit 50% of their free throws?

From what I've read he runs a high octane offense that tries to get shots off in under 10 seconds if possible, what kid wouldn't want to be in that type of offense. His Buffalo team averaged 85 points a game which is pretty stout. He also runs an in your face defense. He won 32 games this year including beating Syracuse at Syracuse, Johnson only won 38 in the last 2 years.

Fingers crossed he can turn the ship and at least get to the field of 64.

The more I’ve read about him, the more I like him,

Mostly upset me because it kills all my Gus Malzahn is a certified drivers ed high school teacher jokes