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It required an ugly win Saturday night, but Arkansas is still alive and will play on the second weekend of the 2022 NCAA Tournament.
After going 25 years between trips, the Razorbacks punched their ticket to a second straight Sweet 16 by beating New Mexico State 53-48 at the KeyBank Center in Buffalo, N.Y.
Despite shooting a season-low 27.5 percent from the floor, Arkansas turned in arguably its best defensive performance of the season. It forced 19 turnovers and held a team under 50 points in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1949.
“I mean, these guys play so hard,” head coach Eric Musselman said. “It was obviously not a cosmetically pleasing offensive game, but the toughness and the resilience and the way that we played defense is incredible.”
The Aggies managed to make it a one-possession game on three separate occasions inside the final 70 seconds of the game, but the Razorbacks — as they have so many times this season — iced the game at the free throw line.
Shortly after JD Notae fouled out on a charge call, New Mexico State star Teddy Allen got a sliver of daylight and knocked down a 3-pointer to cut Arkansas’ lead in half, to 46-43, with 1:10 remaining.
Davonte Davis answered by getting fouled going to the basket with only a couple of seconds on the shot clock and 41.6 seconds left in the game. He made both free throws to make it a five-point game.
New Mexico State missed a shot late in the shot clock on the other end, but a wild sequence on the ensuing rebound resulted in an open look for Sir’Jabari Rice and he made the 3 to pull the Aggies within 48-46.
However, just 11.7 seconds were left at that point and Chris Lykes — sandwiched around a dunk by Allen — went 4 of 4 from the line to close out the victory.
Arkansas didn’t make a shot in the final six minutes of the game, scoring its last 12 points at the charity stripe, and made 88 percent (22 of 25) of its free throws.
“Free throws are always important in the game,” Lykes said. “I knew as the game was going on, it's always a dog fight. It's tough for both teams to score. I knew at the end of the game, if it was close, it would come down to free throws.”
Converting their freebies helped the Razorbacks hold on to a lead they built with a key 9-0 run that started with about 8 minutes left.
After New Mexico State regained the lead on a 3-point play by Johnny McCants at the 8:06 mark, Arkansas took it back with four free throws before the biggest sequence of the night.
With the shot clock winding down, Stanley Umude hit a deep 3-pointer to double the Razorbacks’ lead. Then Davis came up with a steal and thread the needle with a bounce pass ahead to Au’Diese Toney streaking down the court for a fast break dunk that put the Razorbacks up by eight.
“It was a perfect pass,” Toney said. “We were just talking about it in the huddle. He was like, ‘Just run. I'll get you.’ It was on the money. I just capitalized on it.”
On a night he missed all six shots he took and scored just two points, Davis made arguably the play of the game by turning the turnover into points with a pass Musselman also described as “incredible.”
“The thing with Devo, he has such great court vision,” Musselman said. “He thrives on making home run plays. Sometimes you want guys to just look for a single, but we see it all the time — he has this dramatic (style), something about having flare to his game.”
Here are some other key takeaways from the win over New Mexico State…
Defending Allen
The story of the game was how well Arkansas shut down Allen, who was fresh off a 37-point performance in an upset win over UConn.
The WAC Player of the Year did manage to score 12 points, but seven of those came in the final five minutes of the game — including five in the final 70 seconds. He was just 5 of 16 from the floor, including 2 of 6 from deep, and didn’t attempt a single free throw after going 13 of 13 at the stripe two days earlier.
“They just doubled, basically, pretty much whenever I had a ball in any type of attacking position,” Allen said. “Credit to them. They had a good game plan. We still could have executed, but sometimes it doesn't work out.”
That game plan was putting Toney on him all game. The Razorbacks’ top defender has been assigned numerous prolific scorer this year and turned in a gem against against Allen.
Simply getting the ball in his hands was tough for New Mexico State, In fact, during a nearly 15-minute stretch that spanned the two halves, Allen attempted just one shot.
