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Arkansas nearly overcame what seemed like an insurmountable deficit, but ultimately came up just short in Saturday’s top-15 showdown against Tennessee.
After trailing by as many as 24 points, the No. 14 Razorbacks had a couple of chances to tie or take the lead in the final minute before falling to the No. 13 Volunteers 78-74 at Thompson-Boling Arena.
It was just the second loss for Arkansas in its final 16 games of the season, snapping a five-game winning streak that included a 10-point win over Tennessee two weeks earlier in Fayetteville.
“We came in here to win the game,” a disappointed Eric Musselman said after the game. “Did not play good at all in the first half. Gave ourselves an opportunity. But we came here to win, and we lost.”
JD Notae made a pair of free throws to pull the Razorbacks within two with just under a minute left and they secured a rebound on the other end, but Notae’s pass ahead in transition sailed over Davonte Davis’ head to turn it over with about 30 seconds remaining.
That forced Arkansas to start fouling. Luckily for the Razorbacks, Zakai Zeigler, who came into the game shooting 87.7% from the line, missed one of two free throws to give them one last chance.
However, after a rare Musselman timeout, Notae’s 3-pointer in the closing seconds came up just short to preserve the victory, but there might have been contact on the attempt. Musselman gave a “no comment” response when asked about the play after the game, but Notae said he thought there could have been a foul.
“I definitely thought it could have been a foul, but they didn’t call it,” Notae said. “Just got to move on.”
Considering the start of the game, it was incredible that Arkansas even made it close down the stretch.
The Volunteers came out of the gates hot, shooting 9 of 12 from beyond the arc in the first half and quickly building a double-digit lead. Arkansas big man Jaylin Williams picked up two early fouls and didn’t play for the final 9:24 of the first half. In fact, a few of Arkansas’ reserves got some run due to foul trouble across the board.
The half ended with Kamani Johnson, KK Robinson and Jaxson Robinson all playing a good chunk of minutes. Johnson battled on the boards while the Robinsons tried to create offensively. Senior guard Chris Lykes also got some run to end the half and it carried over into the second half.
It didn’t matter who Arkansas put in the game, though. The Razorbacks just lacked effort on both sides of the floor. Defensive intensity was missing, as evidenced by Tennessee shooting lights out from deep on open threes and half-hearted close-outs.
Offensively, the Razorbacks were hapless, turning the ball over 10 times, going 7 of 15 at the free throw line and shooting just 36.0% from the field. The Hogs found themselves down 50-29 at halftime.
Tennessee scored more points in the first half Saturday than it did in the entirety of the teams’ first matchup at Bud Walton Arena. They reached that mark with more than two minutes left in the half.
It really was a tale of two halves. Arkansas came out firing in the second half in an effort to dig out of a 21-point hole. The Razorbacks opened up on a 10-2 run to cut the Volunteer lead to 13. They actually got it down to 11 before Tennessee stretched it back to 19.
Musselman pointed to the play of his two starts — Notae and Williams — as well as a couple of key reserves, Johnson and Lykes, as the keys to the turnaround.
“I thought Jaylin played much better, JD played much better and then those two guys off the bench did a really good job,” Musselman said. “We got some good transition looks. Even some of the 3s that we did miss, I thought we got some really clean, quality looks. But obviously we came up short.”
Arkansas tried searching for offense from anywhere – Notae, Williams, the Robinsons – but ultimately it was Lykes who stepped up and helped lead the Hogs on another run.
The 5-foot-7 transfer from Miami scored eight points, including hitting a back-to-back 3s, and had a steal in a three-minute stretch and Arkansas cut it to 11 with just over five minutes left. Notae spoke highly of Lykes’ performance.
“He stepped up,” Notae said. “He was hitting huge shots, playing good defense, got an offensive foul. He just came in off the bench and gave us a spark.”
Musselman echoed the praise for Lykes.
"I thought that was maybe Chris' best game of the year overall for us,” Musselman said. “He was plus-10. By far our highest plus-minus guy.”
From there, Arkansas scored 10 straight to pull within three with 2:05 remaining in the game, but they couldn’t get over the hump.
Here are some other key takeaways from the game…
Tale of Two Halves
Arkansas looked like a completely different team in each half on the road Saturday. In the first half, there seemed to be no consistency, minimal effort, no identity and just poor play.
The Razorbacks shot 36.0% from the field and 46.7% from the free throw line in the first half to go with 10 turnovers. Nine different players got some clock, with eight of them playing 8-plus minutes in the first half.
Musselman said his message to the players was simple and honest.
"We discussed that that's not who we are,” Musselman said. “We're a team that plays really, really hard, plays really good defense and competes at an extremely high level.
“I mean, we were down a guy who has been instrumental in the way we've played. So, when somebody goes down, we need everybody to step up their game. If you don't step up your game when somebody is out, then you're not going to play as good. That's what we saw.”
The second half was drastically different. Eight players saw the court, but the rotation was mainly limited to six players. Williams played nearly the entire second half, while Notae and Stanley Umude logged 19 and 17 minutes, respectively. Lykes added 16, while Johnson played 12.
