STARKVILLE — Midway through his second season, Mississippi State men’s basketball coach Ben Howland is happy with where his team is.
Although Howland returned only three upperclassmen and added six scholarship freshmen and one transfer, Howland feels like things have come together well in the non-conference portion of the schedule.
MSU (8-3) has one last chance to clean up some miscues as it plays host to Missouri-Kansas City (7-7) 7 p.m. today (SEC Network+) inside Humphrey Coliseum in the last non-conference game.
“I think our team’s getting better and I think we’re improving as a team from where we were starting out,” Howland said. “And that’s what you always want to be doing — you want to be continuing to improve as a group as well as individuals. The goal is to continue to improve and keep growing as a team.”
MSU has won back-to-back games with an 86-44 win over Southern Mississippi in Jackson on Dec. 19 and an 85-76 win over Morehead State last Thursday.
Howland’s biggest concern with his team is rebounding. The Bulldogs are even in the rebounding margin with 383 rebounds and 383 rebounds for opponents. Howland says that is not going to get it done when Southeastern Conference play starts with a home game with Alabama Tuesday.
“Emphasis, just keep emphasizing it, blocking out, getting everybody to rebound, all five guys and doing a better job of going to the glass. You have to go every time,” Howland said.
Sophomore forward Aric Holman leads MSU with 6.5 rebounds per game, but he is averaging 24.5 minutes. He has 72 rebounds with 48 coming on the defensive end (10th most in the SEC) and 24 coming on the offensive end.
Sophomore guard/forward Quinndary Weatherspoon is averaging 4.4 rebounds per game. He feels like the team has a lot of improvement to make and like Holwand, he thinks it begins with rebounding.
“Everybody’s got to attack the rebound, offense and defense, as hard as they can and try to go every time,” Weatherspoon said. “We’ve got to box out like coach Howland always says and just try to get the rebound.”
Weatherspoon leads MSU with 18.4 points per game. He has a team-high 166 points in nine games. He missed two games with a wrist injury. Senior point guard I.J. Ready is averaging 11.1 points per game, while Holman is averaging 10.7 points and freshman guard Tyson Carter is averaging 10.0 points.
After two knee injuries and sitting out last season after transferring in from Louisiana Tech, sophomore guard Xavian Stapleton has played in the last two games. He is averaging 6.5 points and 2.0 rebounds per game. Weatherspoon feels like getting Stapleton into the rotation will help with the rebounding woes.
Although Stapleton has been focused on his rehab and getting himself into shape to play basketball again, he has watched his team closely.
“We’re a work in progress, we’re a growing team,” Stapleton said. “Right now I think that we’re in a good spot. A good team will grow through the whole season, so I think we’re in a good spot right now. We’ve still got work to do, we’ve got to keep working and getting better and better and it will all pay off.”
Ready said the team has made some strides but at times takes steps back. He agreed that rebounding has not been the best it could be and fears that will carry over into SEC play resulting in several losses.
With only three players who have played in an SEC game, it will be a new experience for the Bulldogs when they play host to the Crimson Tide.
“I think they’re still learning. It’s a long process and you’ve got to keep learning,” Weatherspoon said. “It’s going to be hard because you can’t really tell them how the SEC’s going to be, you have to wait until they get their own experience. Once they get that first game of the SEC under their belt, they’ll be good.”
MSU lost 72-67 to UMKC last year in Kansas City, Missouri.
The Kangaroos have lost three in a row and five of their last six. The lone win was a 93-71 home victory over William Jewell, an NCAA Division II school. The Kangaroos are led by senior guard LaVell Boyd’s 20.2 points per game.
Howland said he never had a goal in his mind of where he wanted the freshmen to be at the end of non-conference. But he is happy with where is team is with one game left before SEC play.
“I’m excited about our players and think they’re getting better and excited about them continuing to improve. We have flashes from everybody, but the whole thing about being really good is being really consistent,” Howland 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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