It’s always nice to see South Carolina on the schedule, especially when you need a get-right game. Arkansas dominated the woeful Gamecocks 108-74 to get to 3-1 in the SEC.
That hasn’t always been the case. Lamont Paris’s team gave the Hogs all sorts of trouble last season, upsetting them in Columbia and then pushing them to the brink in the SEC Tournament. But the magic may be gone for Carolina, as their defense was no match for this Razorback offense.
Meleek Thomas scored 21 points and Darius Acuff had another double-double: 18 points and 13 assists. Acuff is now in serious danger of ending his four-week SEC Freshman of the Week streak, mostly because he may be behind Thomas for the honor. Nick Pringle scored 15 points and added seven rebounds against his old team, ending a streak of several games in which he really struggled.
The Hogs essentially led wire-to-wire. After a back-and-forth start, Arkansas jumped to a 20-12 lead and forced a Gamecock timeout. It looked for a bit like this one was going to become a blowout in the first half, but some late defensive lapses allowed the Gamecocks to stay in it, though the Hogs were pretty much in control with a 50-38 halftime lead.
The Hogs then opened the second half en fuego. At one point, the Hogs made nine consecutive field goals. They scored 30 points in the first eight minutes of the second half, reaching a 79-48 lead with 12:49 to play in the game. They barely slowed down after that: a spectacular Pringle alley-oop from Wagner made it 108-65 with 2:31 to play, but Carolina ended the game with a 9-0 garbage-time run to give us our final margin.
- The case for Karter Knox
- Box Score Breakdown: Kentucky 85, Arkansas 77
- Matchup Analysis: Can the Hogs avoid a monster letdown against struggling Kentucky?
Advanced stats
After Auburn destroyed the Hogs in transition, the Razorbacks righted the ship against the Gamecocks, scoring 51 points in transition and winning fast break points, 32-7. In fact, the Hogs dominated all of the easy basket stats: 22-2 off turnovers, 32-7 fast break, and 66-36 in the paint. Just a total beatdown.
Lots going on here: just a 5% turnover rate, 66% paint usage, 69% paint eFG%. You won’t lose many games with stats like that. South Carolina’s offense wasn’t awful, posting a paint eFG% of 67% as Arkansas’ paint defense continues to be a relative weakness. But the Gamecocks struggled to hit jump shots and turned it over on 22% of possessions, which created a lot of Arkansas’ transition opportunities.
Poor Meechie Johnson was a one-man show for the Gamecocks. He’s had one of the weirdest transfer patterns you will ever see:
After six years of college basketball, you’d expect him to be pretty good, and he’s finally breaking through this year, with this 29-point, six-assist performance going down as one of the best of his career.
For the Hogs, Thomas continues to be a plus-minus monster. Even when he doesn’t shoot well, he defends (note the four steals) and contributes to offensive spacing. Given that Karter Knox and Billy Richmond III have been inconsistent all season, Arkansas will probably be at its best when it can play with a smaller lineup with Acuff, Thomas, and DJ Wagner on the floor together. We may do a deeper dive into lineup combinations in a future piece.
Highlights
Other scores
I’m adding a new “other scores” section rather than writing a separate post to discuss other SEC scores and news.
Kentucky 74, LSU 73. Playing without Jaland Lowe (out for the season) and Jayden Quaintance (out for now, may not be healthy this year), Kentucky trailed 38-22 at the half and by as many as 18 points in the second half before mounting an impressive comeback in Baton Rouge. The Tigers completely collapsed, missing two free throws with one second left and then allowing the Cats to perfectly execute the Christian Laettner play, with Malachi Moreno sinking the game-winner from the elbow as time expired. This win certainly calls off the dogs in Lexington enough so that they’re not calling for Mark Pope to fired in-season… but is this a turnaround? LSU is really bad (now 0-4 in the SEC), and Kentucky still has no point guard. The Wildcats may have enough raw talent to put together an 8-10 SEC record and sneak into the Dance, but they’ll have to keep winning close games. As for LSU, it’s been nice knowing you, Matt McMahon. A week after getting bodyslammed by also-bad South Carolina, McMahon probably sits on the hottest seat in the SEC. He had to have this game with an 18-point lead.
Ole Miss 97, Georgia 95 (OT). This surprising result keeps the Rebels as a Quad-1 win for now. As long as Ole Miss stays in the top-75 of the NET, that’s a good win for the Hogs. For Georgia, the momentum from an overachieving start may be running out. Georgia boosted its metrics by running up scores on bad teams, but they are now 2-2 in the SEC. They did beat Auburn, but their last three games have been a 15-point loss to Florida, a narrow comeback win over South Carolina, and this loss.
Texas 80, Vanderbilt 64. Vandy’s unbeaten run was bound to end sometime, but watch out for Texas. This is their first really good win, but the metrics have liked them for awhile thanks to a solid offense that dominates the offensive glass and makes a living in transition and at the free throw line.
Missouri 84, Auburn 74. Like many others, I am skeptical that Steven Pearl is going to keep Auburn anywhere near where his father had them. The Tigers can feed off their home crowd and be competitive at home, but they are 0-3 in true road games and this was their fourth double-digit loss away from the friendly confines of Auburn Arena. The good news is that Auburn still has to come to Fayetteville next month.
John Calipari knows that loss was bad, and he didn’t even try to hide it in last night’s press conference when he found out about the loss to Missouri:
Up next
Arkansas is on the road Saturday against Georgia. The Bulldogs remain in the top-25 for now, but they’ll have to beat the Hogs to stay there because of the midweek loss. Georgia is much better than expected this season, but that loss might be a reality check. The Bulldogs play extremely fast, so expect a very high-scoring game.
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