Razorbacks move up to No. 9 in AP Poll; ready to host S. Dakota State Wednesday

Arkansas jumped to No. 9 in the AP Poll on Monday and now they hope to add another win in to their record on Wednesday night when they host South Dakota State.

Arkansas (2-0) was No. 10 in the preseason poll, but after wins over North Dakota State and Fordham they got bumped up one spot. South Dakota State (1-1) lost its season opener to Akron 81-80 in overtime, but bounced back to take a 68-66 victory over Boise State. They face St. Bonaventure tonight before taking on the Hogs Wednesday. Eric Musselman isn't taking South Dakota State lightly.

"South Dakota State is not a well-coached team, they’re an excellent-coached basketball team," Musselman said. "They have a lot of skilled position players. You’re talking about one of the top two most efficient offenses last year in the entire country. You’re talking about great shooting at the 1, 2 and the 3 spot.

"34, (Alex) Arians, he’s a lefty, he’s got great toughness. He can make open threes. He’s got a pull-up game off the bounce mid-range. (Zeke) Mayo, No. 2, a primary scorer. He can create his own shot. Has great range. He’s got deep, deep, deep range. (Charlie) Easley, No. 30 at the small forward spot, can really shoot the ball.

"(William) Kyle (III), No. 42, is an excellent, excellent freshman. A high-level player. Their staff did a great job of recruiting a player that can be put in a starting lineup and can produce early in his career. Then 32 (Matt) Dentlinger is a guy off to a great start the first two basketball games for them. He was part of the rotation last year and has now elevated his game as opportunity came. Then off the bench they've got two really good shooters in No. 1 (Matt) Mims and No. 15 (Tanner Te Slaa). Those guys can really shoot the ball. And then (Luke) Appel we're assuming is coming back or close to coming back, No. 13, who will be one of their best returning players who has not played in their first two games. But it would be anticipated that he would play in our game Wednesday. Then No. 11 (Matthew) Mors plays extremely hard as well at that forward spot for South Dakota State."

The win over Boise State caught Musselman's attention from his days at Nevada.

"And then you add in the fact that Coach (Leon) Rice and Boise State, we have incredible respect for Boise State," Musselman said. "And I know how tough it is to win in that building, because we had to try to do it for four years."

Arkansas has played its first two games without freshman preseason All-America guard Nick Smith Jr. Musselman provided an update on his availability.

"Nick has not practiced," Musselman said. "He's doing some stuff on his own shooting, rehabbing with the trainer. He hasn't practiced, so we're just going to stick to going day-byday. He has not practiced with us and he continues to slowly but surely improve. Each day that goes by gets closer to rejoining us in practice but he's not there as of today."

Musselman talked about how the team has handled not having Smith Jr., who is projected to be a lottery pick in the 2023 NBA Draft. Smith has been dealing with knee pain management.

"We had to make a lot of adjustments without Nick because we spend a good portion of our offseason developing play packages and roles around him, but I think the guys have done an incredible job," Musselman said. "The guys have created an identity through two games, a defensive identity. Scheme-wise, especially defensively, I think we're ahead of maybe where we thought we'd be defensively and we have to continue to get better from an offensive standpoint.

"We miss Nick for sure, especially offensively and perimeter shooting, but I think guys have stepped into different roles. We kind of saw it develop as the game unfolded in Game 2. We did not go into that game thinking Ricky Council would be handling the ball in middle pickand-roll, but that's what the game called for, and that was an adjustment based on how Fordham was defending us. So, we continue to tinker and add different wrinkles to our sets as we see different defenses, and that will probably develop through the first half of our first 15 games. We'll probably still be a group that's tinkering and trying to anticipate what we will see both defensively and offensively."

Musselman also talked about the oddity in college basketball scheduling that has South Dakota State playing Tuesday night then taking on the Hogs the next day on the road.

"South Dakota State, you’re talking about a team that won 30 games last year," Musselman said. "There’s not a lot of people that want to play them. It’s hard for us right now to schedule games and it’s hard for South Dakota State to schedule games, so the dates worked out really well for us. Like last year we saw Hofstra fly into Little Rock the day of the game and they didn’t charter. We’re anticipating South Dakota State will charter and get in the night before the game, but it didn’t really affect Hofstra too much because that was probably a game that we felt they were as ready to play against us as anybody that we played all last season.

"With the shooting that South Dakota State has, if we don’t play great 3-point defense… And they’re a much underrated post-up team. They’re going to throw the ball inside to 32 (Matt) Dentlinger) and they’re going to throw it into 42 (William) Kyle. So you have two dilemmas. You’ve got to guard the 3 and you also have to guard them at the 4, 5 spot interior post-defense wise as well."

With the Razorbacks winning 76-58 over North Dakota State and 74-48 against Fordham they haven't been tested yet. But that didn't stop Musselman from having a list of things the team needs to improve on.

"I think a lot," Musselman said. "I think we’re sharing the ball, but our passing numbers right now have been right around that 150 to 170. So we’re about 30 passes to 45 passes short of what the teams were the last two years towards the second half of the last two years. So we still have time to improve on different people touching the ball. I think that our centers have enough speed that they could get more rim layups or paint dunks in transition. Would like to try to play with a little bit more pace offensively. I think that we walk the ball up the floor at times a little bit more than maybe what we would like. And then like every team in the country offensive execution can certainly improve.

"I think there’s probably 300plus teams that would probably say that about themselves offensively. And especially when you’re talking about 11 new players. There’s going to be some uncertainty on still gathering where guys like the ball, spacing, go-to plays lategame, need-a-basket plays, all of those are still going to develop not just Wednesday. That’s going to be a process probably all the way into late December and early January."

Arkansas will hit the road for the Maui Jim Maui Invitational after this game. They will take on Louisville Monday at 4 p.m. (CT) and it will be televised on ESPN2.