STARKVILLE — Ben Howland was looking for consistency.
After dominating Arkansas offensively and defensively in a 22-point victory, the Mississippi State men’s basketball coach wanted his team to play with the same fire and intensity in its next game.
But MSU looked like a different team than it did four days ago and struggled in almost every aspect in a 66-57 loss to Georgia on Saturday night at Humphrey Coliseum.
“We had great practices, I thought,” Howland said. “I thought we had really good preparation, and I really felt good going into this game. It’s both ends of the floor that are the problem, maybe even more so just attacking the zone.”
MSU (10-14, 3-9 Southeastern Conference) trailed 32-21 at halftime after shooting 26 percent (7 of 27) from the field. MSU made more 3-pointers (four) than conventional field goals (three) in the opening half, as Craig Sword (13 points) and Gavin Ware (six points) were in foul trouble and combined for three points, all by Sword, in the first 20 minutes.
Georgia (14-9, 7-5) scored the first six points of the second half to extend its lead to 38-21 with 18 minutes, 31 seconds remaining. MSU answered with a 12-0 run to cut the lead to 51-41 with 9:40 remaining, but Georgia scored the next five points to make it 56-41. MSU outscored Georgia 16-10 down the stretch, but it wasn’t enough to overcome the poor start.
Quinndary Weatherspoon (team-high 17 points) said MSU didn’t practice enough against a zone defense.
“I just didn’t attack the zone like I usually do and I settled for a lot of jump shots, something I shouldn’t have been doing,” Weatherspoon said. “We had a lot of open looks and good looks, we just couldn’t hit. Our shot wasn’t falling.”
Howland said MSU focused on its man-to-man defense more than offense in practice this week, but he said they knew what Georgia was capable of doing in the zone defense. He felt like the zone sped them up.
Georgia coach Mark Fox said his team played the zone defense more out of necessity because his team was fatigued. It worked, though, as the homestanding Bulldogs shot 31 percent (21 of 68), a far cry of 53 percent (27 of 51) they shot against the Razorbacks.
“I think we did a good job on defense,” said Georgia’s Yante Maten, who had 15 of his game-high 25 points in the first half. “We limited them to maybe one offensive play. We were strong on the glass and I think that helped as well. I think our zone matched up with their offensive plays extremely well.”
Georgia’s Charles Mann scored a season-high 21 points.
MSU shot 34 percent (14 of 41) in the second half and outscored Georgia 36-34, but Georgia outrebounded MSU 45-35 and had a 34-14 edge in points in the paint. The Bulldogs scored two points in the paint in the first 25 minutes, a direct result of Georgia’s zone defense.
The biggest concern for Howland entering SEC play was defense. On Tuesday, he switched back from a zone a man-to-man defense and it helped hold the Razorbacks to 22-percent shooting from the field. For the most part, Howland was happy with the defensive effort, as Georgia shot 46 percent (25 of 45) from the field and 25 percent (3 of 12) from 3-point range. But Howland said there some things his team didn’t do well on defense and things Georgie did well offensively.
“Them setting good screens in their offense was really hard for us,” Howland said. “Their toughness, their physicality and how they post up, are all things that we talked about and was really evident with how they played.”
Weatherspoon said the inability to guard a ball screen is concerning and something he said the Bulldogs will have to work on in practice.
Howland really felt like his team made a turn for the better against Arkansas and wanted to see how it would handle success and respond after playing its best game of the season. Weatherspoon agreed with Howland that practices were good this week, but the result wasn’t. However, Weatherspoon feels like things can be fixed as the season continues to wear on.
“We’ve just got to keep playing hard and come to practice and compete every day. I think that will help. Overall, we’ve just got to keep fighting,” Weatherspoon said.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Ben Wait on Twitter @bcwait
Ben Wait reports on Mississippi State University sports for The Dispatch.
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