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Arkansas bounced back from its heartbreaking loss at Alabama with yet another blowout win over Missouri on Tuesday.
Although the margin wasn’t as large as the first go around in Fayetteville, and despite the Tigers trying to claw back into it late, the No. 23 Razorbacks were never really threatened in a 76-57 win at Mizzou Arena in Columbia, Mo.
With the win, Arkansas improved to 20-6 overall and 9-4 in SEC play. Having won 10 of its last 11 games, with the aforementioned one-point loss to the Tide the only blemish, the Razorbacks are now the only team in the conference to reach 20 wins in each of the last three seasons.
"That's what great teams are all about,” Trey Wade said. “We had to bounce back. We took a loss. We bounced back and got a W, and we want to keep it rolling. There's nothing more to it."
It was tight for the first few minutes before Arkansas went on a 15-0 run highlighted by a pair of 3s from Stanley Umude and one by JD Notae.
“I think we just came in real focused,” Umude said. “We had a good game plan. We were all just really locked in on what we needed to do.”
The Razorbacks used another spurt at the end of the first half to push their lead to 19 at halftime and then maintained that lead throughout the first 10 minutes of the second half.
Missouri did try to crawl back into it late, though. The Tigers went on a 9-0 run to cut their deficit to 11, but after the under-8 media timeout, Arkansas expanded its lead back to as much as 21 before ultimately winning by 19.
It was a balanced effort by the Razorbacks, who had five players score in double figures and won nearly every aspect of the game.
“I think we’re real tough to beat when we’re clicking like that,” Umude said. “We have a lot of talent and when we’re trusting each other, believe in each other and we’re moving the ball like that offensively, we’re going to be hard to beat, especially if we’re playing defense at a high level.”
Here are several key takeaways from the win…
Umude Continues to Shine
Umude has looked every bit of what fans and coaches expected of him over the past few weeks. Against Missouri, he turned in a 23-point, 5-rebound performance on 8-of-13 shooting, including 6 of 9 from beyond the arc.
Since conference play started, Umude is averaging 14 points and shooting 42.9% from 3-point range. His offensive emergence this season has been reminiscent of his time at South Dakota, as the transfer has put up performances of 31, 28 and 23 points in conference play, as well as two games at 19 points.
“He’s a really tough cover because he can shoot the ball and he can also score inside,” head coach Eric Musselman said. “And then you add the fact that he’s really stroking the ball at a high percentage from three, he opens up dribble-drive angles for other players.”
