Hogs overcome 19-point deficit, hang on to beat Auburn

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FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas dug itself out of a 19-point hole and then hung on for a much needed victory Wednesday night.

Sharife Cooper’s drive to the basket in the closing seconds ended with Moses Moody knocking the ball loose and coming down with the rebound to secure the Razorbacks’ 75-73 win over Auburn at Bud Walton Arena.

After a shot clock violation gave the Tigers the ball with 26 seconds left, there was very little doubt that their star freshman - who already had 25 points - would take the last shot. However, Moody and Justin Smith converged on him at the block and made it tough on him.

“Our big thing was just to wall him up and make sure we went vertical,” head coach Eric Musselman said. “Under no circumstances did we want free throws attempted. It was demanded that there’s absolutely zero chance that we put them on the foul line and we just had to go vertical, kind of converge on him.”

Moody made 1 of 2 free throws after coming down with the rebound and Allen Flanigan’s last-second heave didn’t hit anything, capping a frenetic final 2.5 minutes in which the Razorbacks saw their eight-point lead dwindle to one.

The win gave Arkansas a season sweep of Auburn and snapped an ugly two-game losing streak, improving it to 11-4 overall and 3-4 in SEC play.

“I would take that effort and the energy they played with anywhere against anybody,” Musselman said. “When you play like that, I thought they really laid it on the line in a game we had to win.”

Much like that last two games, the Razorbacks got off to a rough start offensively. They made just three of their first 19 attempts, with five of those shots being blocked by the Tigers.

Although they had a better effort defensively, forcing four turnovers and getting several more deflections in the first five minutes, the Razorbacks’ anemic offense kept them from capitalizing.

Auburn eventually found its grove after the first media timeout and got some open looks. That led to a 16-2 run to put Arkansas in yet another big first-half hole, this time 23-8.

It wasn’t until Jalen Tate knocked down a corner three-pointer at the 7:48 mark that Arkansas finally reached double digits after being stuck at eight points for more than five minutes.

“I thought we had some offensive carryover from our last two games in that first half and we talked about being a little bit looser offensively,” Musselman said. “I just thought we needed a few shots to go down.”

After back-to-back bad turnovers by Tate and JD Notae, the second of which led to a fast-break dunk by JT Thor, Musselman called his second timeout of the game.

The Tigers stretched their lead to 19 on another three-pointer by Cooper - who had been just 1 of 16 entering the night - shortly after that, but then Arkansas seemed to flip a switch and the shots started falling.

The Razorbacks used a 13-4 run to cut the deficit to 10 before Cooper made a pair of free throws in the closing seconds to make it 43-31 at the half.

“We talked about trying to win that last 4-minute segment, trying to give us some life, some breathing room,” Musselman said. “(Down) 12 points is really, really manageable. I thought even when we were down 19, (in) our huddles we had a little bit different belief than we did the past two games.”

Following a rough opening 12 minutes when it scored just eight points on 3 of 19 shooting, Arkansas made nine of its last 12 attempts while scoring 23 points in the last eight.

Sure enough, that continued after halftime. The Razorbacks out-scored Auburn 18-4 in the first four minutes of the second half.

That run was capped by a highlight-reel putback dunk by Jaylin Williams, who grabbed an offensive rebound and threw down a one-handed slam, to give Arkansas its first lead of the night.

Williams made a three-pointer during that stretch, too, but it was the only one - in five tries - the Razorbacks made in the second half, as they attempted a season-low 15 shots from beyond the arc and made a concerted effort to get to the rim.

“We wanted to put pressure on their defense as much as we could and I thought we did that,” Musselman said. “I did not want to come out in the second half and see long rebounds lead to long run-outs for Auburn. If you attack off the dribble-drive and get to the rim, I think it allows your defense to get a little more set.”

It proved to be the first of five lead changes during a three-minute stretch, but Arkansas eventually took control with an impressive sequence.

Held scoreless for the first 31 minutes of the game, Moody came up with an offensive rebound after a missed free throw and made a layup that put the Razorbacks up for good.

On the other end of the court, Arkansas forced a shot clock violation and then Desi Sills - who scored a team-high 22 points - made a pair of free throws after getting fouled on a drive to the basket. He came up with a steal on the next defensive possession and that ultimately led to an alley-oop from Tate to Smith that gave the Razorbacks a six-point cushion with 7:07 remaining.

Musselman credited his team’s pace of play for the dramatically improved offensive numbers in the second half.

“I don’t know if a team could’ve played any harder in the second half, the last 20 minutes,” Musselman said. “I mean, we had guys absolutely gassed in timeouts.”

When Sills made another couple of free throws to make it 74-66 with 2:40 remaining, it seems like Arkansas might win comfortably.

Instead, with Tate on the bench after fouling out, the Razorbacks missed their last five shots and struggled against the press, allowing Auburn to get back in it and set up the aforementioned final play by Cooper.

The result was the same, but Wednesday’s win was much different than the one three weeks earlier in Auburn, when Arkansas managed to pull away for a 12-point victory.

It was all the same to Musselman, though, as his team was in desperate need of a win following road losses at LSU and Alabama by a combined 47 points and losses in four of its last five games after that first win over the Tigers.

“I think our locker room is excited,” Musselman said. “I think our young guys got to learn a little bit because we really didn’t have a point guard there at the end when we were trying to break a press. When you can win and also use video to try to learn some things, I think that’s really good as well.”

Arkansas is scheduled to hit the road again Saturday, with a noon CT tip against Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tenn. The game will be televised on the SEC Network.