Arkansas appeared to be coasting to an easy win on Wednesday in the first round of the SEC Tournament, but they hit a cold spell from the field and found themselves in a fight to hold on and defeat South Carolina 72-68 at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tenn.
Arkansas held a 20-point lead, 54-34, with 17:08 left in the game. But South Carolina continued to fight and John Calipari was just happy to see his team win and advance to face No. 8 seed Ole Miss on Thursday at noon.
"At this point, you want to win games," Calipari said. "I'll look at the tape and figure out. But I just thought we got tentative and was trying to get out of the gym. You can't play that way. We have a bunch of guys that compete and did what they had to to win the game, so I'm happy. Would you like to have it a big score? Yeah. But at this time of the year, everybody's fighting for their lives.
"South Carolina, in a different league, they're good. They got big guys. They got guards. I mean, this league is unforgiving."
The win avenged a 72-53 loss to the Gamecocks on Saturday, March 1, in Columbia. In that game, Arkansas scored 14 points in the first half. On Wednesday the Hogs held a 47-30 advantage at the intermission.
The Gamecocks got to within one point, 61-60 with 4:20 remaining in the game. However, the Razorbacks never surrendered the lead. They did go from a Billy Richmond field goal with 14:18 left to make it 59-41 to not making another basket from the field until 2:30 remained in the game. D.J. Wagner nailed a 3-pointer to put the Hogs up 64-60. That was just shy of 12 minutes without a field goal. Following the game, Wagner talked about the big trey.
"It felt good, just seeing I had the open shot," Wagner said. "Just taking that shot. My coach and my teammates influencing all of us. Like if we got plays, make 'em. I was open. I shot it. I know my team and coaches had confidence in me to take that shot. It went in. That's what happened."
Following Wagner's basket, South Carolina's Jacobi Wright hit two free throws to cut the lead in half with 1:57 remaining. Trevon Brazile, who led the Hogs with 16 points while pulling down seven rebounds and four steals, got the lead by to four 66-62 with 1:38 left on the clock.
Wright then once again hit a basket to pull the Gamecocks back to two points, 66-64, with 47 seconds remaining. Johnell "Nelly" Davis then took over for the Razorbacks. Davis hit a field goal and four free throws in the final seconds to allow the Razorbacks to escape with the victory. Davis finished the game with 14 points, two assists and three steals.
Jonas Aidoo, who transferred to Arkansas from Tennessee, finished with 14 points, 11 rebounds, a block and one steal, talked about the 11-0 run by Arkansas to finish off the first half.
"Really important," Aidoo said. "We try to get out in transition as much as we can, get stops, get out in transition. I feel like that helped a lot. Like Coach said, we got tentative. We can't do that next game. We got to keep going at them every single time."
Aidoo didn't score in the second half. He was asked if South Carolina did something different on defense in the final 20 minutes?
"No, I just wasn't being aggressive, looking for my shot as much as I was in the first half," Aidoo said. "I definitely got to do better with that, tell my teammates where I want the ball, be more aggressive on the offensive end in the second half, for sure."
In the win over Arkansas on March 1, Collin Murray-Boyles had 35 points. On Wednesday, Murray-Boyles finished with 20 points, 12 rebounds, two assists, one block and a pair of steals before fouling out in the final seconds. Jamarii Thomas added 16 points and Wright 13 for South Carolina (12-20).
Arkansas (20-12) got 13 points and six assists from Wagner. Billy Richmond had nine points, two rebounds, four assists and two blocks in the game. Zvonimir Ivisic had four points, five rebounds and a block though he appeared to injure his shooting hand. Karter Knox had two points.
Arkansas shot 45% (25-56) from the field compared to 39% (23-59). The Razorbacks hit 32% (7-22) from beyond the arc. South Carolina hit 35% (8-25) from three-point territory. Each team had 11 turnovers and the Hogs had 34 rebounds compared to 36 for the Gamecocks.
Arkansas will take on No. 8 seed Ole Miss (21-10) on Thursday at noon. Ole Miss defeated the Razorbacks 73-66 on Wednesday, Jan. 8, in Fayetteville. Thursday's game will be on the SEC Network.