Alabama
Alabama junior DT Jehiem Oatis will redshirt this season and enter NCAA transfer portal
Alabama defensive tackle Jehiem Oatis has decided to redshirt for the 2024 season and will enter the NCAA transfer portal.
The junior said that decreased playing time was the primary factor in his decision. Oatis, listed at 6-foot-5 and 325 pounds, appeared in five games for the Crimson Tide this season, accumulating one tackle and one pass deflected. In his three seasons at Alabama, he has 57 tackles, 1 1/2 sacks, three tackles for loss and five passes deflected.
“Getting the reps and looks that I’m getting,” Oatis said to ESPN’s Pete Thamel. “I feel like it’s better for me to move on somewhere new.”
Oatis, a former four-star recruit and the sixth-ranked defensive tackle in the 2022 recruiting class, has played an average of 16 snaps per game this season. By comparison, he averaged more than 22 snaps per game last year and more than 24 during the 2022 season.
In Alabama’s two biggest games so far this season against Wisconsin and Georgia, Oatis played 25 total snaps. Oatis didn’t play in the Tide’s upset loss to Vanderbilt on Saturday due to a knee injury.
During the spring, he had surgeries on his shoulder, knee and ankle, which limited his ability to practice. Alabama defensive coordinator Kane Wommack referenced Oatis’ injuries when discussing the matter with reporters on Monday.
“He’s been battling some injuries and, you know, has not been able to perform or produce the way that any of us would like,” Wommack said, via The Tuscaloosa News. “But my focus is really on the players that are going to do everything they can to help us win football games. And so that’s really where my focus is at right now.”
At his Monday news conference, Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer said coaches felt Oatis was leaning toward this decision.
“Felt like it was going that way,” DeBoer said. “I think what we also have to understand is there’s other elements to this, right? There’s health elements, there’s life elements. I love these guys, they’ve worked hard. Jehiem’s choices and things, there’s reasons for that.”
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TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (WBRC) – Pauline Love, the new head coach of the Alabama women’s basketball team, says her late college coach, Joye Lee-McNelis, is the reason she got into coaching.
Love played for Lee-McNelis at Southern Miss, describing her as a second mother. Lee-McNelis passed away last summer after a long battle with breast cancer.
A relationship that changed her path
Love said she once told Lee-McNelis she would never go into coaching, a conversation the two laughed about often.
“I used to tell her all the time, I would never do this. I would never put up with somebody like me or I would never work for somebody like her. I was like coach, you’re crazy. We used to laugh about it all the time and she was like you’ll see one day, you’ll see,” Love said.
Love had planned to work in the tech industry. Instead, she has spent 15 years in coaching.
“She pretty much paved the way for me. There’s no way I’d be sitting here if it wasn’t for her,” Love said.
High expectations at Alabama
Love returns to Tuscaloosa after previously serving as an assistant at Alabama. She was introduced as head coach in April, and was brought to tears when she mentioned Lee-McNelis during that introduction.
Her goals for the program are clear.
“I’m going to have a passion about it. I want to bring a Final Four to the University of Alabama and make Tuscaloosa proud,” Love said.
This year’s roster includes Spring Garden’s Ace Austin, back for her sophomore season.
Love said she wants her players to know that difficult times are part of the process.
“I can say for them, I’ve been there. I’ve done it. Just learn how to figure out and fight through hard things. You gotta do something hard and fight through it and I promise you it’s rewarding at the end of it,” Love said.
Love said she also wants to be a source of support for her players off the court, the same way Lee-McNelis was for her.
“I know we always get caught up in the money part of it, but I got a group of girls that doesn’t care about that. They want to care about making the fans happy and giving them something good to watch,” Love said.
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Alabama football fans are invited to a preseason pep rally Aug. 4 at the Tuscaloosa River Market.
The pep rally is part of the annual fall kickoff event hosted by the Tuscaloosa County chapter of the University of Alabama National Alumni Association.
The family friendly event will begin at 5:30 p.m. at the River Market, 1900 Jack Warner Parkway. Tickets, which include a barbecue dinner, cost $30 for adults and $15 for children ages 8 to 12. Children 7 years old and younger will be admitted for free.
The pep rally will feature live entertainment, a silent auction and a range of family-friendly activities. There will also be a cash bar with wine and beer.
Tickets can be purchased on the chapter’s website, tuscaloosacountyuaalumni.com. Membership in the local alumni chapter is not required for attendance.
University of Alabama President Peter Mohler and UA baseball coach Rob Vaughn will be part of the festivities.
Mohler began his duties as UA president on July 21, 2025.
Before being named UA president, Mohler spent nearly 15 years at Ohio State University, where he held senior leadership roles overseeing research, innovation and economic development. He also served as OSU’s acting president, providing leadership during a pivotal period for one of the nation’s largest public universities.
Mohler earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Wake Forest University and a PhD in cell and molecular physiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Duke University Medical Center before joining the faculty at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
Vaughn has been UA’s head baseball coach for three years, leading the Crimson Tide to the College Baseball World Series in 2026.
The Humble, Texas, native served as head baseball coach at Maryland for five seasons before coming to Tuscaloosa.
Vaughn played collegiate baseball at Kansas State, where his position was catcher.
Alabama begins the 2026 football season on Sept. 5 with a home game against the East Carolina Pirates. Kickoff is set for 11 a.m. at Bryant-Denny Stadium.
Other Alabama home games include Florida State on Sept. 19, South Carolina on Sept. 26, Georgia on Oct. 10, Texas A&M on Oct. 24, Chattanooga on Nov. 21 and Auburn on Nov. 28.
Reach Ken Roberts at ken.roberts@tuscaloosanews.com. To support his work, please subscribe to The Tuscaloosa News.
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