Gameday Live: Arkansas vs Montana State
The Arkansas Razorbacks will take on the Montana Grizzlies on Saturday afternoon at 4 p.m. (CST) in Bud Walton Arena.
The Hogs are 2-0 this season, and they beat North Texas, 66-43, in their latest game on Tuesday. For the second game in a row, guards Mason Jones and Isaiah Joe were the lead scorers for Arkansas, as they both finished with 16 points. Joe leads the team in minutes this season with 70, and he has scored 20.0 points per game. The sophomore also is the top assist man on the squad, as he’s dished out nine, so far. Jones is the leading scorer on the team with an average of 24.0 per contest. He is also tied for the lead in rebounds for the Razorbacks with Adrio Bailey, as they’ve both brought down five boards per contest.
“People just don’t understand in college basketball with a 40-minute game, a player gets hot and anything can happen,” Razorback head coach Eric Musselman said. “That’s why literally every night, not just across college basketball, but almost every night across our conference, there are games coming down to the wire in these non-conference stuff. You know, Montana isn’t going to come in here scared. They are well-coached. They are tough.”
WHO: Arkansas Razorbacks (2-0) vs. Montana Grizzlies (1-1)
WHEN: Saturday, Nov. 16 at 4 p.m. (CST)
WHERE: Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville (Ark.)
Last season, Montana finished the year with a record of 26-9, and they were 16-4 in Big Sky Conference play. They went onto win their conference tournament and earned a bid to the NCAA Tournament as the No. 15 seed. The Grizzlies have gone 1-1 this season with a loss to Stanford in their season opener on the road, 72-63, and a win over MSU Northern at home, 64-50.
“You just got to play,” Musselman said. “That is certainly something that we talk to our team about every night. You have an incredible respect for your opponent and an understanding that you got to play for 40 minutes. You can’t play a college basketball game for 12 minutes and come away with a win. You can’t turn it on and off like a light switch. You got to bring it. Hopefully, we’ll continue to play the defense that we’ve played. We understand that teams are going to make some more shots maybe than what we’ve seen. But, we want to stick with our defensive principles and continue to try and get better.”
The Grizzlies are led in scoring by senior guard Sayeed Pridgett. So far this season, Pridgett has scored 47 points on 21-of-33 shooting from the floor. He has also managed to bring down a team-leading 15 boards.
“I’ve known Sayeed for awhile,” Musselman said. “We recruited him at Nevada. He's from Oakland. Seen him play against my younger son at one point a long time ago. Just a really good basketball player. Really multi-dimensional can play a combo guard. When they go really small they play him at the 4-spot. Against quicker people, he'll post up against smaller, quick guys. Then he plays right out of that mid-post and does a great job of facing up. Then if you put a bigger guy on him they like to isolate him. So he obviously creates a lot of mismatch problems. He's one of the best players in their conference if not the best player in their conference. Obviously, the tradition of Montana in the Big Sky is phenomenal as far as what they have done in making NCAA Tournaments.”
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