NASHVILLE — The postseason has arrived, and for the first time since 2021, when Ole Miss limped into the NIT, the Rebels aren’t just making a cursory bow-out of the Southeastern Conference Tournament.
Instead, Ole Miss (21-10 overall, 10-8 in the SEC) begin the postseason Thursday trying to fine tune its game in time for next week’s NCAA Tournament.
"Let's not forget what got us here," Ole Miss coach Chris Beard said Tuesday before the Rebels left Oxford for Nashville. “The team that competed early on with Houston (in a closed scrimmage) and Illinois early on (in a preseason exhibition), then beat BYU and competed with Purdue, beat Colorado State (and) Louisville, had a road win at Alabama and a team with quality home wins like Tennessee at home. It's a reminder that this is what got us here. This is who we are. This is our identity. So in postseason play, you simply want to be us.
“What you don't want to do is have guys that try to do things they haven't tried all year or the team playing a different way than we have all year. To me, it's been that simple to describe, but it's challenging to get done. I believe if we bring Ole Miss' best game on offense and defense that we've seen throughout the season, then we'll have a chance to be competitive this month.”
The Rebels’ postseason run begins Thursday at noon versus Arkansas. The Razorbacks (20-12 overall, 8-10 SEC) defeated South Carolina, 72-68, in the opening game of the SEC Tournament Wednesday.
Arkansas flirted with disaster, letting a 17-point halftime lead deteriorate to just one point before closing out the Gamecocks in the final minutes.
"We're still in the process of getting better," Arkansas coach John Calipari said. "We're playing our best basketball. We're letting teams back in but we're still winning. ...I'm proud of these kids."
Trevon Brazille led the Razorbacks with 16 points on Wednesday. Johnell Davis and Jonas Aidoo added 14 each. D.J. Wagner Jr. had 13. Arkansas led by as many as 20 in the second half before going ice cold. The Hogs went eight minutes without scoring, allowing South Carolina to pull within striking distance.
Collin Murray-Boyles, a likely first-round pick almost certainly playing his final collegiate game, led South Carolina with a game-high 20 points.
Ole Miss defeated Arkansas at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville on Jan. 8, 73-66. Malik Dia led the Rebels that night with 21 points. Sean Pedulla added 16 and Dre Davis 10. Adou Theiro led Arkansas with 17 points. Johnell Davis added 15, Boogie Fland 14 and DJ Wagner Jr. 11.
"My team is different," Calipari said. "I've got totally a different team and (Ole Miss) has played well all year. Chris has done a fabulous job. It'll be a hard game for us. That was a long time ago. That was the second game of the year."
Both Theiro (knee) and Fland (hand) are unavailable Thursday. Fland is hoping to return for the NCAA Tournament and Theiro’s timetbable for a return isn’t known.
"It depends on how far we advance," Calipari said, regarding the chances of Theiro and Fland returning for the NCAA Tournament.
In that game in Fayetteville, Ole Miss out-rebounded Arkansas, 30-27, and held the Razorbacks to 37.3 percent from the floor and just 21.7 percent from the 3-point line.
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Arkansas is now safely in the NCAA Tournament, regardless of what happens Thursday or, potentially, later this week in Nashville.
It wasn’t always headed in that direction. The Razorbacks started SEC play losing five straight games, including the home loss to Ole Miss. Depleted by injuries and an offseason decision that nearly backfired, the Hogs won eight of their final regular season 13 games — including four of their last five — to regain a postseason pulse. With only a seven-man rotation and the team's top two scorers out with injuries, the Razorbacks have turned their season around, winning four of their last five games entering this week's SEC Tournament.
"I've done this a long time and this may be the most rewarding season for me because they are a bunch of good kids that struggled early," Calipari told CBS Sports’ Brandon Marcello.
As Marcello chronicled in an excellent deep dive into he Razorbacks’ program earlier this week, the shorthanded Hogs defeated No. 15 Missouri, a team they lost to by 18 earlier this year with a healthy roster, and drilled Vanderbilt on the road earlier this month. They threatened to beat No. 1 Auburn in a back-and-forth road loss in February and stormed back in an 85-81 loss to No. 3 Alabama. Still, there have been stinkers. The Hogs lost 72-53 at South Carolina in a game where they scored only 14 points in the first half.
"Here's what we know: we can lose to anybody, we can beat anybody," Calipari told CBS Sports. ”So what do you want to do? You can be miserable or win the game.”
"Six weeks ago, I was worried about winning a few games in the league, not necessarily getting to the NCAA Tournament," Arkansas athletics director Hunter Yurachek told CBS Sports. "The fact that we're sitting on the last Saturday of the regular season and, I think, squarely in the NCAA Tournament is just a credit to what he and his staff and those young men have done.”
"We've always been together," Wagner told CBS Sports. "I don't think that was the problem. It was just learning how to play with a lot of talented players. It's hard to run sets with everybody being really talented, and get in the groove of things. I feel like when it narrowed down, and you don't have to put too many people in the rotation, that's when it started clicking.”
Interestingly, Calipari is already recalibrating his approach to building his second Arkansas team. The long-time Kentucky coach, with the help of Arkansas super booster/Tyson Foods chairman John Tyson, plans to build a deeper team next season in Fayetteville.
"Philosophically, he recognizes that," Tyson told Marcello. "So does that mean one more freshman or one more portal?
"Once you get into players nine, 10 or 11, the money changes a little bit. Ten or 11 might be the player that's got two years left in the portal, and I can [develop] you from there to here, or it's the freshman that you can say you're going to be here until your junior year and I'll get you into a position (to be drafted). That'll be the conversation. It's not the one-and-done, but it'll be the ones you develop.”
Ole Miss, meanwhile, is getting its stay in Nashville underway with no pressure. The Rebels are firmly in the NCAA Tournament and will receive a bid on Sunday no matter how well — or poorly — they perform at Bridgestone Arena.
Ole Miss coach Chris Beard has spent part of this week focusing on improving the Rebels’ defense, which has been leaky down the stretch.
Ole Miss surrendered 106 points in a blowout loss at Auburn, gave up 84 to Oklahoma in a game decided in the final seconds, allowed a dozen 3-pointers in a dramatic win over Tennessee and then another 90 points in the regular-season finale at Florida.
Against an Arkansas team that has recently found its offensive groove, the Rebels will likely need to improve on defense to advance to Friday, where top-seeded Auburn awaits.
Team defense, it starts with the individual pieces. Each player that's out there, all five have to do their job. We really have to play to our strengths and improve our weaknesses. When you add the team aspect of it, there's five guys out here, so you have to play together. 'Hey, you might be driven off the bounce, so I'll be there to help. You might need some help on that rebound. You got him one-on-one so let me help this guy.' So it's like the individual piece of defense with everybody doing their job, and then you have five guys that are connecting.
"It all starts with effort, attitude and body language,” Beard said Tuesday before the Rebels departed for Nashville. "Some of our defensive mistakes, like many of teams around the country, is effort. We talk about transition defense, but if we're not willing to run from A-to-B as fast as you possibly can run, there's not much to talk about tactic-wise. The rebounding game is the same thing. If you're not willing to hit your man, there's not much we can talk about tactic wise.
"We have been a good defense all-year long, been nationally ranked defensively most of the season, more competitive in the categories in the SEC, so that's improvement over year one. But now it has to show up in March. It has to be the best version for us to have a defense that can make a run here this month."
