Despite suffering its sixth conference loss of the season, Arkansas (10-10, 1-6 SEC) played connected as one unit in its 63-57 defeat to No. 6 Kentucky on Saturday night inside Bud Walton Arena.
With five SEC blowouts on its resume, there was a legit question of whether or not Arkansas would be competitive against a Wildcats team that entered the game as the No. 1 scoring offense in the country (89.9 points per game).
The Hogs were also without four-year glue-guy and leader Davonte Davis, who has stepped away from the program, per an official release from Arkansas Athletics. To add insult to injury, high-rising forward Trevon Brazile didn't play due to lingering knee soreness.
Even with its postseason hopes hanging on by a thread, forward Chandler Lawson still found positives in the loss. The senior racked up five points, seven rebounds, two blocks and two assists in 25:07 minutes of game action against the Wildcats.
"Of course, we can build on this," Lawson said after the game. "I know we don’t want to celebrate moral victories. I feel like we should’ve won. We won in the rebounding and the hustle. That’s the area we’ve looked lost at, I feel like. We’re getting our chemistry back and I feel like gaining our trust with each other."
Fifth-year head coach Eric Musselman applauded the Hogs' defensive effort throughout the game, including a mesmerizing first half that saw Kentucky only score 24 points.
"I thought following the game plan tonight, I didn’t think we had guys just going off and doing whatever they wanted defensively," Musselman said. "I thought we were extremely disciplined. I thought there were two plays late in the second half where we got undisciplined, and they hit two threes.
"But for sure, I’m going to assume it's our best defensive game of the year. We lost the game, but I think they started off 1-of-14. Our bigs were challenging everything. We were running them off the three-point line, so yeah, it was a good defensive performance and it was not a good offensive performance."
For the first time since non-conference play, effort was at an all-time high consistently throughout the matchup. The end result wasn't ideal, but winnable games on the horizon could lead to a late-season turnaround.
"I don’t fault the connectivity that the team had and I do not fault their effort one bit tonight," Musselman said. "I thought they played as hard as they could play. I thought the first half, it was flawless how they executed on both sides of the ball.
"And we’re short-handed. But I thought the effort, again … I’ve not been happy with the effort over the course of the last couple of weeks. Tonight, I’ve got to go in that locker room and tell them we’ve got to get ready for Missouri. And I can’t fault their effort."
Up next, Arkansas will travel Wednesday to take on the Missouri Tigers (8-12, 0-7 SEC) in Columbia, Missouri. The game is set to tip off at 7:30 p.m. CT and will broadcast on the SEC Network.
