Chris Jans had three timeouts in his pocket on Saturday when Ole Miss guard Matthew Murrell hit a game-tying 3-pointer with 8.3 seconds left in regulation. But Mississippi State’s head coach did not use any of them.
Surely, the Bulldogs would be drawing up a play for their leading scorer, sophomore guard Josh Hubbard. Yes, Hubbard’s jumper had been off Saturday — he was 2-for-11 shooting at the time — but he is still MSU’s most consistent offensive player and a threat to pull up from anywhere inside half court.
Except the five Bulldogs on the floor were Shawn Jones, Riley Kugel, RJ Melendez, Cameron Matthews and KeShawn Murphy. Hubbard was not on the court for the most critical play of the game.
Last season, that would almost certainly not have been the case. But this year, MSU has enough shooters to take some of the pressure off Hubbard. On that final possession of regulation, the ball never left Kugel’s hands and never moved inside the arc, and Kugel’s deep step-back 3-pointer rimmed out. The Florida transfer would redeem himself in overtime, though, hitting a transition 3 from the corner that gave the Bulldogs the lead for good.
Kugel played 30 minutes off the bench against the Rebels, leading all scorers with 21 points. But he was not on the floor to start overtime, having twisted his ankle on the final shot of regulation — the same ankle that kept him out of MSU’s 22-point loss at No. 1 Auburn four days earlier.
“I knew I had to get back out there,” Kugel said. “I had twisted the same foot, but I was going to do whatever I could to get back out on the floor. Really it was just a mental thing. I had to get back on the court.”
The No. 14 Bulldogs (15-3, 3-2 Southeastern Conference) also missed Kugel against Kentucky on Jan. 11. MSU struggled to shoot the ball from outside in a five-point loss to the Wildcats, a game in which Kugel went to the locker room in the first half after a collision under the basket. He returned for two minutes and 17 seconds in the second half, drilling a 3-pointer for his only shot attempt during that shift, before sitting out the final 14 minutes.
Kugel was 2-for-4 from deep that night. The rest of the Bulldogs were 10-for-36. Then with Kugel on the bench against Auburn, MSU was a mere 3-for-24 from behind the arc. His return against the Bulldogs’ biggest rivals revitalized the entire team, and MSU will need more where that came from as its gauntlet of an SEC schedule continues.
— Benjamin Rosenberg
Bulldogs lack dynamism, show same old struggles in Ole Miss loss
Mississippi State suffered another disappointment in Southeastern Conference play on Sunday. The Bulldogs fell to 2-4 in conference play with a 71-63 loss to Ole Miss, a game that was tied 61-61 going into the final minutes.
The Bulldogs turned the ball over 23 times on Sunday, their most in any contest since their loss to Kentucky a year ago and the sixth 20+ turnover game of the season. The team currently averages 16.5 turnovers per game, the highest average in more than a decade, and gives extra possessions to every opponent, from Chicago State to South Carolina.
That is the crux of MSU’s issues at the moment, but there was something else evident between the two teams on Sunday. There was another instance of running out of ideas down the stretch after good stretches early on, and there was a lack of scoring options beyond JerKaila Jordan and Eniya Russell, but above all, the Bulldogs simply lacked dynamism.
The standout player on the floor for either team was Madison Scott, scoring a career-high 30 points in the best individual performance of the season for Ole Miss.
She isn’t a player who averages close to 30 a game, but she is a player who makes her presence known. She can bully the opposition and get to the foul line, something she did eight times against the Bulldogs. Even if she isn’t scoring she makes her presence known, and on Sunday the Bulldogs had no answer for her.
MSU simply doesn’t have that sort of presence on the roster, whether it be someone to match up with a player like Scott defensively or take it to her on the offensive end. It is a talented team, but something is lacking in between the talented guards and promising post players.
It’s the sort of problem only good teams have, and head coach Sam Purcell has a good team, but it’s clear right now that there are problems with fundamentals and game changers keeping them from becoming a great team.
— Colin Damms
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