NEWARK, N.J. — If there was any indication that Saturday afternoon’s neutral-site game at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J., had a road game feel, all you needed to do was look around.
A sea of scarlet and black filled the lower bowl as Rutgers brought a strong crowd with it to the Gotham Classic against Mississippi State, the scheduled ‘home’ team on this day.
From the opening bucket, the Bulldogs felt the noise of ‘The Rock,’ and it played quite the factor in the first half. However, as the game matured, so did MSU, riding a career day from forward Jimmy Bell Jr. for a key 70-60 non-conference win over the Scarlet Knights.
“Credit to them, they played hard on defense,” Bell Jr. said. “(But) today was my day. My teammates found me and I was able to score the ball.”
Bell Jr. was the backbone for the Bulldogs (10-2) on Saturday, putting together his best game of the season with a season-high 17-point, 18-rebound double-double. His 18 rebounds are a career-high and included six offensive boards. Four of those came in the first half, a half in which both teams struggled to generate offense.
“That’s just work paying off,” Bell Jr. said. “I feel like I’m one of the hardest workers in the country. You ask anybody, I just put in the work and if you put in the work, the results are going to show.”
Both teams shot under 40 percent in the half, but while MSU wasn’t scoring, it was getting boards, out-rebounding the Scarlet Knights 22-13 in the first half.
Bell Jr. easily made the biggest impact, hauling in four offensive boards over that time as his day was just beginning in Newark, and at a time where the Bulldogs missed 11 straight shots and failed to score for nearly three minutes, he was that much more important.
“We have a lot of respect for Coach (Steve) Pikiell, the program and the players,” head coach Chris Jans said. “We talked about (Cliff) Omoruyi a lot and I think Jimmy took it personally. … He was our anchor to a lot of things we were trying to do offensively. … Jimmy executed the game plan really well.”
A key swing late in the first half, where MSU led 29-24, saw that lead dissipate as a last-second steal and 3-point basket from Aundre Hyatt tied things at 29-29 going into the half.
After the offense sputtered in the first half, the Bulldogs found their stride in the second, shooting above 46 percent from the field and thriving at the foul line.
“We played the two-for-one game,” Jans said. “Unfortunately, both of our twos were turnovers and they scored five points as a result of them. It wasn’t the way we wanted to end the half. … We just really tried to reset it and play with a lot of confidence. I thought a big factor in the second half was our ability to take care of the ball.”
Fouls were plentiful for both sides, but MSU made its mark at the charity stripe, shooting 14-of-17 from the line in the final 20 minutes of play and 22-of-26 overall.
It wasn’t just Bell Jr. who came up big down low as fellow forward Cam Matthews posted a double-double of his own with 16 points and 11 rebounds.
The Bulldogs won the battle of the boards handily against a Rutgers team struggling for any semblance of rebounding consistency, 47-26, and on a day where the Bulldogs shot 4-of-16 from beyond the arc, it was the interior that shined in a hostile “road” environment.
“The biggest key that we talked about was rebounding,” Jans said. “I felt like that needed to be our calling card today. That was going to give us extra possessions and limit theirs and I thought for the most part, we did a pretty good job.”
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