Alabama basketball remains undefeated in SEC play after beating Mississippi State 82-74 in Starkville on Saturday night. The game moved the Crimson Tide to 11-5 on the season, 3-0 in the league.

Mark Sears led Alabama with 22 points, while Latrell Wrightsell Jr. had 19 and Rylan Griffen chipped in 17.

The Tide weren’t perfect offensively, but did enough to get past the Bulldogs, and get a road win in a league where those have been tough to come by this season. Alabama plays again Tuesday at Coleman Coliseum, against Missouri.

Before that, here’s three takeaways from Saturday’s victory.

Stopping Smith

After returning from injury recently, Mississippi State’s Tolu Smith has continued on as one of the SEC’s best bigs. Alabama head coach Nate Oats had discussed the importance of stopping Smith ahead of Saturday’s game.

Smith played well. But it wasn’t enough to beat the Crimson Tide, with Grant Nelson putting in solid work on defense to keep him limited.

“He was great,” Oat said of Nelson’s effort. “He used his length, he stood him up. He was able to do it without fouling him much.”

Nelson ended the game with nine rebounds and three blocked shots. He was helped in his efforts to stop Smith by Mo Wague, who returned from a foot injury against Mississippi State.

Smith had 15 points and 10 rebounds, but Nelson and the rest of the Tide were able to limit the damage.

Searing second half

In the first half of Saturday’s game, Alabama guard Mark Sears was limited offensively. He had five points and went 1-of-4 from the field.

After halftime, it was a different story. Sears racked up 17 points in the second half, finishing with 22, along with two assists and a perfect 8-for-8 from the free throw line.

Oats noted how important that free throw shooting was, with the Tide making 22 of its 26 attempts, while the Bulldogs hit just 15 of their 27.

“It’s good to win on the road when you don’t play great on offense all the time,” Oats said. “We made free throws too. Our four guards went 16-of-16 at the free-throw line.”

‘Answered the bell’

Alabama basketball tracks what Oats calls “blue-collar points.” Those take into account things like offensive rebounds and other hustle plays that don’t always show up on the stat sheet.

On Saturday, the Tide had plenty of them.

“We had us with, I think, 16 more than they did,” Oats said. “And this is a team that is as hard-playing as anybody in the country.”

Oats told his team before the game that if it came out on top in the blue-collar points, it would probably win. That came true on Saturday.

“I thought we played harder than a hard-playing team,” Oats said. “I thought our guys answered the bell when I challenged them to do that.”