Alabama men’s basketball lost its grip on control of the SEC regular season championship with Saturday’s loss to Tennessee. The Crimson Tide’s offense uncharacteristically sputtered in the 81-74 defeat and the Volunteers took sole possession of first place.

WIth just two games remaining until the postseason, UA has to kick things into gear. As he tries to facilitate that, head coach Nate Oats said he’s looking to a success from last season as motivation for the Tide.

“I also told them, we gotta be playing our best basketball,” Oats said. “I talked to them about UConn last year. UConn did not with the Big East. They didn’t win their regular season or the tournament and then went and won the national championship.”

The Huskies finished tied for fourth in the Big East last season. They fell to Marquette in the conference tournament semifinals.

Dan Hurley’s squad then received a No. 4 seed in the NCAA Tournament. UConn wound up beating San Diego State in the championship game to win the school’s fifth men’s basketball national title.

“There’s things teams are playing for beyond just the one game in front of them, but we’ve gotta get momentum going into March,” Oats said. “The SEC tournament, the NCAA tournament, we need to be playing our best basketball.”

Alabama still has a chance to win the regular-season title, but it would require at least one Tennessee loss. The Tide closes the year with a Tuesday matchup at Florida and a home game Saturday at Arkansas.

UA is currently tied for second in the league with South Carolina.

“We have no shot of winning if we don’t come out and go 2-0,” Oats said. “So we gotta come out ready to play, give it a championship-level effort and let the chips fall where they may with Tenneseee’s two games this week.”

Tuesday’s game against Florida is scheduled to tip off at 6 p.m. CT. It will be aired on ESPN.