Nate Oats Says on Hey Coach, “We’ve Got Standards in Our Program”

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - On his weekly appearance on "Hey Coach," Alabama men's basketball head coach Nate Oats told host Chris Stewart that he was "disappointed" in Aden Holloway's behavior following the junior guard's arrest earlier on Monday.

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"Look, we've got standards in our program. We've got ways we've held our guys accountable," Oats said. "We try to keep everything in-house. Obviously, some of the situations you can't. This is one of those. Situation is a little different when we found out what was going on this morning - I found out this morning. I guess it all went down this morning. We had to suspend him pending the investigation by the UA office of student conduct. We're certainly disappointed in his behavior. With that said, we still love him. He's still our guy. We're going to get him the help that he needs. We're gonna continue to help him any way we can...

"We're preparing to play without him this weekend," Oats added.

Holloway was Alabama's second-leading scorer this season, averaging 16.8 points per game to go along with his 3.8 assists and 2.8 rebounds per game. Holloway has started 27 of the 28 games he's played in this season, shooting 48.1% from the floor and 43.8% from three-point range while playing 28.4 minutes per game for Alabama.

The loss of Holloway is big for Alabama on the court, but Oats said on Monday night, "If we were gonna lose a guy, losing him in the backcourt would be the place where we've got the most depth.

"So, you know, Labaron [Philon], [Latrell] Wrightsell, Houston [Mallette], Amari [Allen], Jalil [Bethea], you know, we've got good backcourt depth," he said. "It just means Amari will play less minutes at the four, which is fine, because Taylor's [Bol Bowen] playing great, London's [Jemison] playing great. Noah [Williamson] gave us good minutes. So I think we can get a little bigger. I did tell the team, 'This team, more than any team I've ever coached, is better equipped to handle a situation like this.' I don't know how many games we went into where we had a game-time decision, a guy warms up, and we gotta decide whether he's gonna play or not an hour before the game."

Alabama will almost certainly be without Holloway for the start of the NCAA tournament on Friday afternoon against Hofstra after Holloway was "removed from campus," pending an investigation by the UA Office of Student Conduct.

Alabama will face Hofstra in the first round of the NCAA tournament on Friday, March 20, at 2:15 p.m. CT.

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Wyatt Fulton is the Tide 100.9 DME and Brand Manager, primarily covering Alabama Crimson Tide football and men's basketball. For more Crimson Tide coverage, follow Wyatt on X (Formerly known as Twitter) at @FultonW_.