STARKVILLE — When Mississippi State lost eight of nine games from Dec. 20 to Jan. 25, the Bulldogs’ record and postseason chances suffered significantly.
MSU’s players, though, didn’t let that get them down.
“If you’d come watch us practice when we were having some tough losses, they were coming to practice the next day with good attitudes and good approaches,” coach Chris Jans said Wednesday.
Maybe they knew a stretch like this was on the horizon.
The Bulldogs stayed the course like their coaches told them to. They trusted the talent that got them out to an 11-0 start to the season.
Now, they’ve won four straight games and have begun to put that losing skid far behind them.
“It makes you feel good when you can say, ‘Hey, it works. I told you if you stick together we’d have better days, our results would get better,’” Jans said.
Home-crowd support has been a big help. One of the Bulldogs’ goals is to “make people feel good when they leave the Hump,” and Mississippi State has definitely done that lately.
Three of MSU’s wins during this stretch have come in Starkville, including their overtime upset of then-No. 11 TCU on Jan. 28.
Mississippi State (16-8, 4-7 Southeastern Conference) also handled South Carolina on the road Jan. 31 in a comfortable 66-51 victory.
The Bulldogs will have to hit the road at 5 p.m. Saturday for a trip to Arkansas, a program in a somewhat similar spot.
The Razorbacks (17-7, 6-5 SEC) have won five of six games since starting out 1-5 in conference play. They’re coming off an 88-73 win over Kentucky on Tuesday at Rupp Arena.
Beating Arkansas on the road would be critical for Mississippi State’s NCAA tournament case.
Jans said the Bulldogs are trying to take things one game at a time, and as such, they know the magnitude of each of their final seven regular-season games.
“They understand what’s riding on it and how meaningful each and every outing that we have the rest of the year is,” Jans said.
Given the hole the Bulldogs dug themselves with their 1-7 SEC start, they’ll likely have to go at least 4-3 to close the season to have a shot at an at-large bid. A 5-2 finish would mean a .500 SEC record, 21 wins and a considerably more likely tournament case.
MSU has some tough games left, including Saturday’s game at Bud Walton Arena, home games against Kentucky and Texas A&M and a trip to Missouri.
But the way the Bulldogs have been playing, they feel confident in continuing to build.
“I’m not going to jinx it, but I feel like we’re doing a pretty good job on this four-game winning streak,” forward D.J. Jeffries said.
It’s a big step for a team that not long ago looked unprepared to compete in the SEC in Jans’ first season.
And the Bulldogs coach is happy to see the progress his players have made.
“It feels good to be able to look at them now and then just to have the enjoyment in the locker room and that winning feeling coursing through the program,” Jans said.
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
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