Everything Eric Musselman said after Arkansas’ struggle against MSU
Arkansas coach Eric Musselman’s post-game press conferences are predictable at this point.
His Razorbacks fell Saturday at Mississippi State, 71-67, in game in which Arkansas was outshot at the free-throw line 32-19. Musselman has not been a fan lately of the discrepancy between his team’s number of shots from the line compared to their opponents, especially as that style of offense is Arkansas’ bread-and-butter.
Musselman has said time and again he hesitates in being too critical of officiating because he prefers not to have to pay a fine to the Southeastern Conference for getting on the officials too much. Such was the case again Wednesday.
The reality is Arkansas played a solid game for what it had. Neither Jalen Graham or Trevon Brazile were available, which meant the Hogs had zero power forwards on the roster. Guards had to defend MSU bigs most of the game leading to a 42-27 rebounding advantage for the Bulldogs.
The good news is some of Arkansas’ players who had been struggling stepped up, giving hope to Hogs faithful and Musselman himself that the team can finish the year strong.
Here’s what Musselman had to say after the game.
Overall thoughts
I think super proud of the effort. When you’re without a preseason all-league player that’s 6-foot-11, any team in the league would go through some struggles. … I thought tonight we played 40 minutes. Mississippi State’s an extremely physical team. Coach Jans is a great defensive coach. Anybody who has played against coach Jans’ teams, whether it’s New Mexico State…how the free throws are 32-19, I have no idea. We can have a limited roster and we have three players foul out, so, super proud of our team. I know the fans, I know our locker room, I know our coaching staff, our players, super frustrated without coming away with a win. But with any ball club, it’s can you improve and do you give it your all and all you playing with effort, energy and enthusiasm. We played as hard as we could tonight.
Thinking down 1
We were trying to run what we ran most of the second half when we scored 38 points and scored nine more points than we did in the first half. We made an adjustment with how we were running our middle pick-and-roll. We had a guard down-pin for Ki Mitchell to come up to the top of the circle and set a screen for El Ellis. … But obviously when you have 3-point threats like Battle and Mark not out there, we had a ball club today where we did not have a power forward on the roster and we had three guys foul out. And their power forward, that position got dominated today because we had guards playing it or two centers playing it. Much credit to Cam Matthews and his performance. But gameplan was try to do what we could with Tolu Smith. … Lost the game, though.
Down by 3 with seven seconds
We were looking to get a 3. We felt with seven seconds full court, you’re going to take at least three seconds on the clock. If we were in the NBA and you can advance the ball, certainly would have gone for two. But there’s no advancing the ball in men’s college basketball. There is women’s college basketball. There is the NBA. There is in the G League. But there’s not here. Seven seconds, down three, we thought the best decision being on the road was trying to get a 3.
Khalif Battle
I thought Battle was really, really good offensively. I thought Ki Mitchell was outstanding. I thought Davenport’s three offensive rebounds were huge for us. I thought Chandler Lawson did an incredible job defensively. … Thought T-Mark helped us int he stretches when he wasn’t in foul trouble. I thought El Ellis played his best floor game. I thought Baye Fall came in very, very limited minutes, he altered two shots, had a shot block. A lot of really good performances tonight by guys on our team that weren’t in uniform.
Makhi bounce-back
We needed his physicality. I thought he did a great job in pick-and-rolls, both as a short roller making plays, which we used utitlized him in spots … It was a really good game for him to step up. We knew that Tolu Smith is an incredibly offensively talented player. We wanted to make Smith defend a little bit. I thought that Ki did that by aggressively going to the basket.
Looking at A&M
I think when the schedule came out we knew we’d play the last game on a Wednesday and a fairly early game on a Saturday. We’re not playing on Wednesday again, we’re playing on Tuesday. Three games in that amount of time, with two travels, the scheduling didn’t do us any favor. We’ve got to get ready for a very good team with a lot of experience that plays extremely well at home.
Menifield's and Graham's healt
I haven’t checked on that (whether they will be ready for A&M). I’m a competitor. Every fiber in my body right now is thinking about this game, so I don’t mean to be rude, but I really have not checked with the trainer. … I probably won’t ask the trainer until Monday. It’s irrelevant right now. Probably none of them will practice tomorrow if we practice at all.
Rebounding margin
They’re a great offensive rebounding team. They’re super physical. We did not have a power forward even available tonight. We’re playing Davenport there. He’s played the small forward his whole life. That particular matchup, at the4-spot, Cam Matthews went 6 of 7 and he took 10 free-throws attempted, which is almost more than our whole team by the way, and he had 10 rebounds. Four of those being offensively. We knew Tolu Smith would rebound. … Certainly the 17 offensive rebounds is problematic. But we also knew that from a size standpoint without Graham and without Brazile that’s going to be an area of concern. Just as it’s going to be an area of concern when we go to A&M.
Battle's ups and downs
When we’re not playing as well as we would like to, as a coach, I have a decision to make. The decision has been to continue to try to find combinations that put us in the best position to win. KB has been a worker. Tonight offensively, I thought he had a good matchup. Certainly when he’s scoring the ball and drawing free throws we’re a much better offensive team. I think his defensive principles have improved, as well. Certainly him fouling out tonight hurt us offensively in the late stages of the game.
Why was there such a free-throw discrepancy?
I can’t answer that. Doesn’t matter what we send in, what we talk about. You look at the free-throws attempted. They’re a high-steal team. Normally high-steal teams are high-foul teams. I have the utmost respect for coach Jans and the physicality that his teams have played with. … That’s a part of our offensive, quite frankly. We work on it. We talk about it. We drill it. Just as if a 3-point shooting team doens’t get any 3-pointers, that’s part of our offense. We got 19 free-throws attempted. … I mean, they took 32. I don’t know what else to say other than the numbers don’t lie.
