Alabama’s last-second loss at Tennessee came down to a pair of uncalled timeouts. The first came when Crimson Tide head coach Nate Oats failed to bail out freshman guard Labaron Philon before he was whistled for a five-second violation with 3.8 seconds remaining. The second occurred when officials didn’t notice Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes frantically signaling for a timeout right before Jahmai Mashack’s game-winning 3 at the buzzer.

Both non-calls proved costly for the Tide and ultimately saw No. 6 Alabama suffer a 79-76 loss to No. 5 Tennessee.

Following the game, Oats took ownership for not calling a timeout to prevent Philon’s five-second violation. Barnes, on the other hand, admits he was fortunate not to have cost Tennessee the win.

“To be honest with you, I was calling a timeout,” Barnes told reporters after the game. “I didn’t see the play. I knew the way they lined up, Shack [Mashack] and I made eye contact, and I felt like if he could get it and get it as far dow the floo. If we could just get it across halfcourt and have one second on the clock, we got a play where I thought we could get a high-percentage shot instead of the shot from halfcourt.”

Sure enough, Barnes began signaling for a timeout with 1.6 seconds remaining, just as Mashack was crossing halfcourt. After failing to draw the referee’s attention, Barnes angrily shouted for a whistle, even turning his back to the Mashack before the guard’s game-winning shot.

Barnes said he gave Mashack the option to shoot on the play but figured he would end up calling a timeout before the guard had the opportunity to pull one off.

“I looked at him and said, if you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go,” Barnes said. “They know I’m going to call the timeout.”

While that didn’t go as planned, Barnes ended up benefiting from forgetting a step in his original strategy.

“I made one good coaching move today; I didn’t tell the referee I was going to call a timeout,” Barnes said. “I normally tell them. I normally tell them. And they would have probably given it to me, you know?”

Instead, no whistle was called, the shot was made and Alabama suffered a heartbreaking defeat.