A Super Talk, Mississippi Media Production.

It's a thunder and lightning extra here on the podcast feed.

Today, obviously, it's Rumbling's Day, so no time for real sports talk.

So let's do some of that here.

With Emily Smar, she covers the Crimson Tide for the Tuscaloosa News,

covers specifically basketball.

It's crazy to think about that, Emily, because,'m an old man, and like 10, 15 years ago,

there would have been no use for your position.

Alabama fans could not have cared less about basketball.

But now it's a huge thing.

Nate Oates has that program really going in the right direction, and they have been a thorn

in the side of Mississippi State since he's been there. Chris Jans is 0 and 5 against Nate Oates.

What is, I mean, the easy answer is they have great players. But what's the more complicated

answer of why Alabama has been such a tough matchup for Mississippi State, a state

that's beaten, you know, Tennessee, Auburn, other teams in that timeframe, but can't beat Alabama?

Again, I think that this is really just the system that we see with Tennessee, Auburn, other teams in that time frame, but can't beat Alabama.

Again, I think that this is really just the system that we see with Nate Oates, that time and time again,

it's the formula that other teams can't really beat.

I mean, the closest that we've, I think, personally, I think that we've seen a team come close to,

obviously other than the losses that they have taken, but the closest that we saw a team come close to, you know, obviously other than the losses that they have taken,

but the closest that we saw a team come to was Kentucky.

And Kentucky, Mark Pope is basically running the same Nate Oates offense over there.

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