Alabama basketball dominated Vanderbilt, winning 93-40 in a bounceback victory on Tuesday after losing to Oklahoma.
Brandon Miller, a native of Antioch, Tennessee, led by 22 points, 13 of them in the second half. The Crimson Tide hit 19 3-pointers while scoring 10 dunks. The profit margin of 57 points is the largest in the history of the program.
Fifth-seeded Crimson Tide (19-3, 9-0 SEC) fell behind but started with a 21-0 run to open the game in the first half. Alabama shot 57.7% from the field en route to a 28-point lead at halftime. The Commodores (10-12, 3-6) couldn’t stop the bleeding in the second half as Alabama’s lead stretched to 46 late in the second half.
Strong start out of the gate
The Crimson Tide allowed five points early but forced the Commodores into a more than four-minute goal drought early in the first half with a 0-for-14 shooting. Alabama forced seven early turnovers, resulting in 12 points for the Crimson Tide.
Alabama made 11 of his first 20 shots and at one point he made seven shots in a row, including a stretch of 9 of 13 shots made. It was the start Alabama needed to recover from Saturday’s 24-point loss in Oklahoma and end a series of slower starts on offense.
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Vanderbilt struggles on offense
Vanderbilt shot 32% off the field in a loss to Texas A&M on Saturday, and the percentage got worse against Alabama. The Commodores shot 15.2% from the field in the first half, having separate stretches of 0-of-14 and 1-of-12 in the first half, and 25% for the game. Vanderbilt had five field goals and repeated turnovers in the first half, while Alabama had 10 3-pointers on 15 shots.
Vanderbilt passed the Crimson Tide 22 to 19 in the first half and had 12 offensive rebounds for 10 second chance points.
Balanced Alabama attack leads the way
Alabama was able to spread the points across the board, once again led by Miller’s 22 points, but four other players managed to hit double digits. Perhaps the most impressive goal was Nimari Burnett’s 16 points in 15 minutes. Charles Bediako added 10 points and Noah Gurley finished with 11 while Rylan Griffen had 12. Alabama had 11 players who scored at least one point.
The big helpers were Mark Sears with eight assists and Jahvin Quinerly with seven.
Next
The Crimson Tide will travel to LSU on Saturday (3:00 p.m., ESPNU) and the Commodores will host Ole Miss (12:00 p.m., SEC Network).