Alabama basketball moved to 2-0 on the season Friday, with a 102-80 win over Indiana State at Coleman Coliseum. Aaron Estrada led the Crimson Tide with 27 points and five assists, while Grant Nelson had the most rebounds with eight.

The Crimson Tide will face an in-state challenger on Tuesday, when South Alabama visits Tuscaloosa. Before that, here are three takeaways from Friday’s victory.

Closer than the score looked

Alabama didn’t get off to a good start. The Sycamores roared out of the gates, scoring the contest’s first nine points while the Tide struggled to keep up.

“That’s a really good, very well coached team,” Alabama head coach Nate Oats said after the game. “We knew it was gonna be that way, we knew it when we scheduled them. They were even better than I thought they were gonna be when we scheduled them.”

Throughout the game, Indiana State was able to keep the score fairly close on the Tide. Isaiah Swope led the way with 17 points for the Sycamores, while Ryan Conwell had 16 and Julian Larry scored 15.

The Tide pulled away late to win the game by more than 20 points. But for an early-season non-conference matchup, Indiana State put up a solid fight.

Newcomers show out

Alabama had a lot of talent to replace for the 2023-24 season. During the offseason, Oats went looking in the portal.

The players he found there were a key part of leading the Crimson Tide to a win on Friday. Estrada especially showed out in the first half, scoring 22 of his 27 in that frame.

“We know what Aaron can do,” Oats said. “We’ve seen it and I think he’s improved, even since last year.”

North Dakota State transfer Grant Nelson has won the team’s hard hat award during the first two games. He had 18 points in the second half for a total of 20 to go with his team-leading rebounding performance against Indiana State.

If both Estrada and Nelson keep on track, they’ll be a major key to replacing Alabama’s lost star power.

Defensive improvement needed

After Alabama struggled on defense at times against Morehead State in the opener, Oats said improving in that area was going to be a major emphasis going forward. Against the Sycamores, he didn’t see what he wanted.

“Our defense was not good again,” Oats said. “We’ve gotta do a way better job on defense. Obviously our rotation got shrunk a little bit from the last game, just with how tight this game was.”

Oats has said that the Tide will continue to tighten up who gets minutes based on which players can figure out defense. He mentioned things like blow-bys and rim protection as specifics he would like to see improved, and noted how much the team is missing Charles Bediako.

The next chance to fix the issues comes Tuesday against the Jaguars. That game is scheduled to tip off at 7 p.m. and will be aired on SEC Network +.

“South will play a different style than Indiana State but they play really hard,” Oats said. “I think coach (Richie) Riley has done a great job down there and we’re just gonna keep preaching defense, defense, defense.”