UA women push unbeaten Miss. St.
FAYETTEVILLE — Morgan William scored a teamhigh 15 points, and Chinwe Okorie added 14 points and 15 rebounds as No. 4 Mississippi State ( 16- 0) remained perfect with a 59- 51 victory over Arkansas on Thursday in Walton Arena.
“It was one of those games,” said Mississippi State Coach Vic Schaefer, who is a former Arkansas assistant coach. “We’ve not been practicing well, and to be honest with you we may have a couple of kids that are feeling a bit of the number – the 15 and the 0, more the 0 than the 15. You can’t play that way.”
Okorie, a 6- 5 forward, finished just three rebounds shy of a double- double in the first quarter as Mississippi State took an 18- 11 edge into the second. The Razorbacks, despite scoring the final four points of the quarter, shot just 3 of 13 and were outrebounded 15- 7 in the opening 10 minutes.
A 5- 0 Razorbacks run in the second quarter cut Mississippi State’s lead to 22- 18. Arkansas pulled within 24- 20, but an 11- 2 Mississippi State run sent the Bulldogs into halftime with a 35- 22 lead. Arkansas shot just 7 of 26 ( 27 percent) from the floor in the opening half.
Arkansas senior Jessica Jackson scored 10 points as part of a 12- 2 Razorbacks run in the third quarter, cutting Mississippi State’s lead to 3834.
Arkansas got within two points late in the fourth, and twice had possession with a chance to tie or take the lead but couldn’t take advantage. The Razorbacks finished the game two of their last 10 from the floor and were held without a field goal over the final 4: 59.
“I think that’s us,” Schaefer said. “I just think that’s who we are. We really live with our defense, we live on stopscorestop.
“We try to talk about it in timeouts; when it gets tough and someone needs a bucket, we seem to get locked in.”
Arkansas’ Malica Monk scored a game- high 17 points on 4 of 12 from the floor and 8 of 9 at the free- throw line. Jackson followed with 12 points, all coming in the second half. Victoria Vivians also added 13 points for the Bulldogs.
Next up for Arkansas is a Sunday afternoon matchup against LSU in Walton Arena. Tipoff is set for 2 p. m.