The most egregious thing to my outside of Alabama mind regarding Ivey was that her position on Roy Moore was, "I believe the accusers are telling the truth (e.g. Roy Moore is definitely a pedophile in my view), but I'm voting for him because I want a Republican in the Senate."
I can hardly think of a worse position to have.
"I have my suspicions about the timing of this allegation, which remains unproven"
"I cannot endorse Moore due to the severity of the allegations, but I remain open-minded."
I don't think she could have done worse if she had said, "I don't believe the accusers, I believe Moore."
Would that have been egregious? Yeah, unless something later showed the allegations were false, but it would have been more consistent than what she did.
As far as the OP and debates.....it's true as someone else noted that debates are virtually meaningless in terms of finding out what someone's position is, but I think they're a necessity just as campaigning is a necessity because it shows (to a point) how respond as a chief executive on your feet to stressful situations, and if you can't handle a difficult question from either a press person or a voter, you shouldn't be making tough decisions about the state, either.
This is most important, of course, when it comes to President because Presidents receive a stature above all other politicians. The purpose of the debate is to put the challenger and Prez on the same level to be judged by the public.
(Side note for history: in 1988, the GOP was so concerned early on about Quayle debating that when the Dukakis camp wanted another debate, they offered to drop the VP debate in exchange for another Prez debate. The Dukakis advisers immediately said no, but a few days later they actually changed their minds and offered to drop it. The expectations of Quayle being able to debate were so low that the Dems figured that as long as he didn't just faint on stage, they'd have a VERY hard time actually winning the debate since winning only requires exceeding expectations and Quayle's were so low. If the GOP had taken that up, of course, we never would have gotten the infamous JFK line from Bentsen - and on the flip side, Quayle might not have begun office in such low standing that he never had a prayer).