TUSCALOOSA, AL— Mark Sears began the season as one of the most highly regarded players in the nation, on the preseason watch list for almost every major individual award in college basketball. But it’s not always easy to live up to the preseason expectations.
Sears was obviously struggling to start the year for the Crimson Tide, but he wasn’t enjoying the same degree of success, particularly from the floor and the three-point line, as he had the previous year. But in Saturday night’s 83-75 victory against Creighton, Alabama’s experienced point guard looked like his old self again, finishing with a season-high 27 points, six rebounds, and four assists.
“He got really locked into just playing hard, playing the right way, doing the right things, and now all of a sudden he’s got his best shooting night, highest scoring output, he’s getting to the rim, makes free throws– just lost himself in the game tonight playing the right way,” Nate Oats, Alabama’s head coach, said afterwards. “This is the best game we’ve seen out of him since the season started.”
Sears shot 55 percent from the floor, making 8 of 15 shots. He made at least four three-pointers for just the second time this season. Alabama’s senior point guard has been going to the free throw line all season, but against the Bluejays, he was much more successful finishing at the rim while still hitting almost 90% from the line.
Oats said Sears had been “outstanding” in practice since before the North Carolina game, in which he scored 20 points. Sears ultimately led the Crimson Tide in blue collar points versus Creighton. Oats tells the players to immerse themselves in the game via their efforts, and he believes it’s no accident that Sears had his greatest performance of the season on Saturday night.
“He’s just so shifty and can score in a lot of different ways,” Creighton head coach Greg McDermott said of Sears. “He played like a vet, and he’s a really, really good point guard.”
Sears made care to thank his teammates for assisting him in getting open and for locating him when he was open. Then it was up to him to make the shots. Through ten games, he leads Alabama in scoring with 17.5 points per game.
Alabama (8-2) has already completed a seven-game stretch with strong nonconference opponents. The Crimson Tide still has three non-conference games remaining, but they are all against considerably softer opponents, with two of them at Coleman Coliseum.
But conference play is just around the horizon, and the first few weeks of the college basketball season have shown how difficult and deep the SEC is this year. There are no easy opponents, and Alabama will need Sears to keep doing what he does best if the Tide is to capture its third regular season crown in five years. Oats is hopeful that Sears is on the right road.
“Hopefully, this kind of gets him going here,” Oats told me.