Nate Oats realized rather quickly that he wasn’t going to be a professional basketball player.

“I fell in love with basketball back in fifth or sixth grade,” Oats told reporters Friday. “By about ninth grade I realized I wasn’t going to play for a living. If I can’t play for a living, I figured I was going to try to get into coaching.”

The young Wisconsinite, now Alabama basketball’s head coach , went looking to learn the craft. One of the first things he found: instructional videos from then-Providence head coach Rick Pitino.

The videos featured the likes of Billy Donovan, Delray Brooks and other stars as demonstrators. Oats doesn’t have a VHS player anymore, but has held onto the tapes throughout his coaching career.

When Oats and his Crimson Tide squad take the floor against St.

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