Scotty Pippen Jr. didn’t blink Wednesday when delivering a line that would loom large over the 24 hours to come. After leading Vanderbilt over Georgia on opening night at the SEC tournament, the hall of famer’s son was clearly amped for Alabama.
Calling the Crimson Tide “beatable” and the team they wanted to see in Tampa was a message that didn’t take long to travel two blocks to the Alabama team hotel. Ultimately, those brash words didn’t light enough of a fire to cost the Commodores — an 82-76 winner Thursday — but it was a long path to the postgame celebration.
Pippen said he heard about the comments in the pregame warmups.
“Before the game, one of the Bama coaches said that you asked for it, so you’re going to get it or something like that,” Pippen said afterward, “so it’s kind of good to get back at him and get the win.”
Oats entered the postgame news conference room moments after the Vanderbilt delegation departed.
“I didn’t know anything about that,” Oats said when asked about the possibility of a staffer saying something to Pippen. “Probably not something we want our assistants doing is talking to the other players before the game. That’s probably not the smartest thing to be doing, so address that afterwards here. I didn’t know anything about that.”
Vanderbilt coach Jerry Stackhouse also commented on the alleged exchange.
“I guess one of the coaches might have said something to him, and that’s fine,” Stackhouse said. “That’s part of the game of basketball. It’s part of the gamesmanship, but at the end of the day, we did what we came out there and backed it up, got off to a little bit of a slow start, but at the end of the day, he made the plays down the stretch to help us win the game and help us survive another day.”
The chatter traced back to Alabama’s 74-72 win in Nashville on Feb. 22, part of string of five wins in six games that had the Crimson Tide on a better trajectory. Pippen and coach Jerry Stackhouse felt like they gave one away to Alabama that night and wanted revenge.
Those quotes quickly made it to the Tide locker room.
“It’s something we talked about,” Alabama point guard Jahvon Quinerly said. “It’s something that did motivate the team. I think we came out with the right energy. We just didn’t put it together for 40 minutes.”
Pippen appeared frustrated early as he missed 12 of his first 13 shots from the field. He appealed for a foul on a 3-point shot before it reached the rim in the first half when Alabama’s lead reached 14 points.
“I think our guys were a little, I don’t know if it’s tight, but we were — (Alabama) came out, and they were aggressive,” Vanderbilt coach Jerry Stackhouse said. “Got into us a little bit, sped us up a little bit. I think Scotty was pressing. I think he had the quote last night that everybody kind of ran with, that it was a winnable game.”
It didn’t look great for the Commodores early in the second half when Keon Ellis’ layup gave Alabama a 51-36 lead. Vanderbilt then scored the next 12 points on a run that got all the way to 21-5 when Pippen’s two foul shots with 9:11 left gave the Commodores its first lead.
Pippen, who finished with a game-high 26 points thanks to 15 made foul shots, smiled when asked about his Wednesday comments a day later.
“Me and Coach Stackhouse were just talking about that,” he said with a grin. “The other team wasn’t too excited I said that either, so it put a chip on their shoulder as well as a chip on ours because I had to back it up, the team had to back it up, so we knew it was going to be a fight tonight.
“But obviously, it was good to get the win after saying that.”
Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism