Miller's second half surge leads Alabama to SEC Tournament final

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WBMA) — For the second time in three seasons, Alabama will be playing for the SEC Tournament championship.

The Crimson Tide trailed Missouri early in the second half of Saturday's semifinal game in Nashville but Brandon Miller came alive on the offensive end of the court to spark a comeback victory. Miller scored 16 of his 20 points in the second half, including knocking down three 3-pointers in the final 12 minutes, leading top-seed Alabama to a 72-61 victory. The win secured a spot in Sunday's final scheduled to tip off at noon.

“If you're going to win a conference tournament, you're going to have to do it in different ways," Alabama coach Nate Oats said. "We said that from the beginning. Today, we found different ways to win. Today wasn't our best game. I thought we came out of the gate fairly strong once again, but defensively we let down in the first half. Beginning of the second half we weren't great. We were forced to call a timeout on the inbounds play. We got after our guys a little bit, they responded well.”

Alabama (28-5) built a double-digit lead in the first half but struggled to shoot the ball from beyond the arc, making two of its first 20 3-point attempts. The Tigers took advantage, cutting into the lead just before the break and carrying that momentum into a four-point lead early in the second half.

But the Crimson Tide had a big response led by Miller. Alabama went on a 18-5 run fueled by 10 points from Miller to reopen its double-digit lead with less than eight minutes to go in the game. Missouri cut the lead to six multiple times but could get no closer to the SEC regular season champions.

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Miller shot 8-of-11 from the field including 3-of-6 from deep. He led the team with 12 rebounds and added four assists, one steal and one block in 30 minutes on the floor. Miller played all 20 minutes of the second half.

With Alabama's guard struggling to find any offensive rhythm, Noah Clowney became the team's second scoring option. He finished with 19 points, the freshman's second highest total of the season, while shooting 7-of-11 from the field and making three 3-pointers of his own.

Mark Sears missed his first eight 3-point attempts but he hit one late in the second half after Missouri cut the lead to six points. Sears finished with 10 points in the game to go with two rebounds and two assists. Fellow starting guard Jahvon Quinerly also struggled to shoot the ball, missing all nine of his field goal attempts and finishing with just one point but he contributed seven assists and three rebounds with just one turnover.

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Alabama shot 49 percent from the floor which included making 20-of-30 attempts from inside the 3-point arc. The Crimson Tide finished with 18 assists on 28 made shots.

Missouri (24-9) scored 18 points off of Alabama's 17 turnovers while the Tigers turned the ball over just five times. The conference tournament's four seed also outscored Alabama in second chance points, 12-9, and fast break points, 18-11.

However, the Tigers were held to just 34 percent shooting from the floor and 28 percent on 3-pointers. The only time this season Missouri finished with a worst shooting percentage in a game this season was in a loss to the Crimson Tide in January.

D'Moi Hodge led Missouri with 21 points. DeAndre Gholston finished with 17 points while Kobe Brown was held to just six points.

Alabama advances to play for the SEC Tournament championship and will play the winner of Vanderbilt-Texas A&M which is underway at Bridgestone Arena.