ESPN.com: Arkansas 67, Mississippi State 62
Courtney Fortson scored a career-high 35 points, carrying Arkansas through the second half as the Razorbacks rallied for a 67-62 win over Mississippi State on Thursday night.
Also:
- ArkansasRazorbacks.com: Fortson leads rally past Mississippi State, Game Stats
- Bob Holt: Fortson’s game
- Robbie Neiswanger: Fortson Fuels Arkansas Comeback, Weather Affects Attendance, Welsh Chips In
- Brady Holzhauer: Full-Court Press
- The Clarion-Ledger: Hogs’ Fortson torches Bulldogs
Cortney had a great second half. He pretty much took on the entire MS State defense for about 15 minutes. Even Steph had a decent game.
Congrats to them for battling through and getting a win.
Agreed really needed that win!
Obviously Fortson took too many shots. Shoulda got the ball into the hands of Clarke, our best shooter, who did not score in the second half. Not enough passing. The box score tells the story. Fortson was playing out of control.
Ninety percent of the time your statement would be true. Last night, Forston was the reason for the victory.
Not Fortson's fault nobody can screen for Clarke. Clarke had the ball plenty of times. He needs to penetrate some. He makes it easy for the defender to fly to the three point line because Clarke won't penetrate.
I love the sarcasm Swineherd!!! Made me laugh out loud!!
Fortson was 9/14 in the 2nd half and Clarke was 1/7 the entire game. Fortson had one heckuva game! I would like to see other players show 3/4 of the will power that Fortson showed last night. Washington still appears willing to let someone other than him to carry the load. Would agree that they need to pass the ball much more and would like to see their play be a little more crisp but today let us celebrate a bunch that we have been pretty hard on all year long. I would like to see the other players energized and perhaps turn a disappointing season into one that might at least take us to the NIT.
Nice win, and what a great performance by Fortson. The West is up for grabs.
9-17, 5-17, 4-12, 5-15, 9-26, 5-16
That's Fortson's FG stats for his only 6 games this season. He's shooting just below 36%. Last night, he shot 53%. He can get into the lane any time he wants, but aside from last night, he takes bad shots and/or just flat out doesn't make them.
A win is a win, right? My concern is that with a win like this, we may start thinking that Fortson is the answer — when we should be trying to correct his sometimes poor shot selection and Clarke's inability to create shots for himself.
I'm just thankful that Fortson has been good at the line this season.
Get game and it's always a pleasure to get a chance to see the Hogs play on ESPN. I was very dissapointed to see all the empty seats in Bud Walton on tv. This directly impacts recruiting and the program. How many more times do you think ESPn comes to town when we put such few fans in the seat. Really disrepectful to team!!!!!
Military – empty seats due to severe ice storm that was ramping up from about 5 pm on. Who knows what crowd would have been.
Students got in free and came in droves, sitting all over the arena. Felt a bit like Barnhill in 1980. I really enjoyed the crowd…much more so than the normal crowd.
Don't know where you were watching the game from. Hope it was nice. The weather was dreadful in north Arkansas on gamenight. Students were admitted FREE or there wouldn't have been as many fans as you saw. There was freezing rain and snow, several inches where I live today. If the team excites, people will come to watch. Otherwise it will be as Yogi said: If they don't wanna come, how ya gonna stop 'em.
Good Win. Great game by Fortson, no doubt. He showed the kind of determination that this team needs.
One win to this bunch, so far, just evens them up with last year. They were set after Bama to win at home and couldn't get it done. If they had they would lead the west. A win at Ole Miss would be HUGE for Pel and this team. If they are going to make a comeback, this is their best chance if not their last.
I think we may have found our new coach: Courtenay Fortson. Not only did he play a great half of basketball, he coached one. Fortson coached that win.
Hey, it could happen. I mean, they've had player-coaches in the NBA, why not college? Didn't Bill Russell play and coach? Larry Bird (not sure)? There must've been a few of 'em, none very successful, as I recall.
Forgive me if I was a little bit flip earlier: I couldn't resist. The inner brat, ya know? Sure ya do.
How 'bout that MVP named Micheal Washington? How'd he do?
Michael who?
Washington was Fortson's lead blocker.
IMO,this team is just not aggressive enough. I think if they would play 90 miles an hour in every game,with finess,Ithink we would see a huge differance.Good win guys, keep it going.Go Hogs Go!!!
How 'bout Steph Welch? His threes kept us in the game in the first half. I was gonna make him my "player of the game" till Courtenay went crazy.
Thanks to Hogs bigmen, Washington and them, Jarvis Varnado had only two blocked shots on the night, instead of his usual ten. That's an important stat, for those who parse such things. The big guys didn't score much, but they did their part in getting the W. They blocked out State's bigs.
Swineherd,
I'm glad your impressed with S. Welsh. I wonder how many games it'll be before he repeats that performance?
M. Washington played one good game against Alabama, but for some reason, I haven't seen the same guy since.
Maybe he'll play more consistant once he get's drafted into the NBA, and if we're real lucky, Welsh will have another good game like the last one before the season is over.
Just think, if those 2 Srs. could actually put together one good game, at the same time, Fortson could actually take a break and not have to shoot so much.
And who even knows the true possibilities of it all. If Those guys were to catch fire all at once, those other teams might actually have to guard someone besides Rotie Clarke.
Wow! Now wouldn't that be something?
You're gonna be seein a new Stef Welsh (I apologize for misspelling his name earlier; Courtney's too. I knew better but I sheepily followed some other illiterate commentator's lead.)
That "three" position is obviously the weakest spot on the team for offense. If that position-player is not a serious offensive threat, it allows defenses to double down inside. We must have scoring from that position to be competitive.
The State game was a paradigm shift. From now on ya gonna see all Fortson alla time, ". . .Fortson fakes right, goes left, cuts back, down the lane, reverse layup. . .Good!! And he draws the foul!! Fortson has taken the game over!" You guys gonna love that.
Course I know some of these guys stand on principle and would rather lose than win ugly, but they just gonna hafta get over it. Fortson, Welsh, Washington gonna hafta put this team on their shoulders and carry 'em to the promised land.
Gonzo, I don't know why W&W aren't consistent at this stage of their careers, as seniors. Either they lack talent or coaching, or both, would be my guess.
Shot selection has a lot to do with shots being blocked. I'm sure there was a lot more focus on that in this game than there was in the first game.
By the way, I wasn't aware Varnado averaged around 10 blocks a game.
What's he got on the year so far, about 200?
Yeah, probly a couple hundred blocks. I'm not sure exactly. They have Ivy League CPAs at big East Coast accounting firms who keep up with that kinda stuff. Me, I'm more a big- picture, strategic-thinker kinda guy. OK, the answer is that he blocks 7.2 shots per 40 minutes of play. Ten against Arkansas, usually. He does hold the SEC record for blocks, previously held by Shaq-O, and is close to the NCAA record (535) [career, not season). So it was an accomplishment to hold him to two blocked shots. Our guys were blocking him out pretty well.
Washington is a good player. . .most of the time. . .when he's not in foul trouble (i.e., the first five minutes of the game).
Hey, these guys are just overgrown kids, doin' the best they can. Hell, I respect the players who are good enough to ride the bench in big-time college basketball. It's a tough gig. Obviously the regulars on this site have high expectations for Hawgball. But we're in a down-cycle for now: maybe the team will get better soon, maybe not.
BTW: The best thing W&W can do for this team is to graduate.
Agreed.