Charleston players were prepared for the spotlight, but not the offensive firepower. Alabama basketball ended the second-longest active winning streak in the country on Friday night, ensuring it wouldn’t be the victim of an upset from a dangerous 13-seed.

The Tide weathered an early stretch, using a mid-first half run to erase a six-point deficit to a 17-point halftime lead and eventual 109-96 final score. Postgame, head coach Pat Kelsey and his players broke down the loss:

“I want to start off by congratulating Alabama. They have a very good team. Nate (Oats) is a terrific coach,” Kelsey said. “They played exceptionally well tonight. I just feel really blessed to have coached this team this year.”

Both teams entered with explosive offenses, KenPom predicted 175 points combined. They averaged 36 and 34 percent, respectively from 3-point range. But while Alabama found success behind the arc, Charleston’s hustle on second-chance points made it 6-2 Cougars early and then 17-11. In the game’s opening three minutes, the Tide committed three turnovers and allowed three offensive rebounds amid a scoreless stretch.

The extra opportunities eventually dried up, however. And the Cougars missed 13 of its initial 15 3-point attempts. It kept trying to initiate offense through screens or hand-offs behind the arc. Alabama sent white jerseys further up-court and clogged passing lanes. Aside from Frankie Policelli hitting some deep shots, the Tide smothered Charleston.

“Obviously, (Alabama is) a super talented offensive team. Just kind of digging in and trying to get the stops and let the offense flow a little bit more. I think we did a good job of that early and just tried and do a better job of keeping that more consistent,” Cougars point guard Reyne Smith said.

The star of the game was Mark Sears and Charleston didn’t have an answer for his 30 points, six assists and four rebounds. When UA needed to stop a run, it was Sears who drove inside, drew a foul and converted his free throws. He went nine-of-11) from the stripe, scoring Alabama’s 100th point late in the second half after beating his defender near the rim and picking up another call.

Sears became the fifth Alabama player to score 30 points in an NCAA Tournament game. Should Alabama reach next weekend’s regional round, Sears could threaten Reggie King’s all-time program record for points in a season (747 in 1979).

“He gave us a handful tonight and maybe let’s take a little bit more pride defensively as an individual and really studying maybe a little more on personnel,” Smith said. “But, yeah, he’s a handful to guard and unfortunately just couldn’t get stops when we needed, fouled a little too much on his drives, kind of being a little too handsy. But got to give him credit, he’s one hell of a player.”

“They run really good actions for him, and he got going. You let a great player like that get going early, the rim starts looking really, really big. You let him shoot 15-foot charity stripe shots to get his confidence up even more. He got on a flow. He had 20 at half, I felt like he had 40,” Kelsey added.

Sears will guide Alabama on Sunday at 6:10 p.m. against upstart No. 12 Grand Canyon.

Nick Alvarez is a reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @nick_a_alvarez or email him at [email protected].