The season has taken a turn for the worse for Vanderbilt.
The No. 15 Commodores (16-3, 3-3 Southeastern Conference) won their first 16 games before losing their last three, including a season-worst 93-68 setback at No. 20 Arkansas on Tuesday night. Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington called that loss “embarrassing.”
The Commodores will try to end the losing streak when they face Mississippi State on Saturday afternoon in Starkville, Miss.
Byington said he tried two different forms of man-to-man defense and a zone against the Razorbacks, but the foe still shot 57.8% from the floor, 40.9% on 3-pointers, and had a scoring advantage of 50-22 in the paint.
“There was nothing we could do to stop them,” Byington said. “We were just on our heels and didn’t compete on defense. (We were) backing up the whole time and not really getting into somebody and playing aggressive defense.”
It was the second consecutive game in which Vanderbilt gave up more than 90 points, following a 98-94 home loss against then-No. 19 Florida on Saturday. But it’s not just defensive slippage that has Byington concerned.
The losing streak began when the Commodores scored a season-low 64 points in a 16-point loss at Texas on Jan. 14.
Byington blamed himself for not doing a good enough job of “prepping” his team for the Arkansas game.
“We came into the game with the wrong mentality, and that’s the first time this year I felt like we didn’t compete and we weren’t tough,” he said. “We’ve got to get back to work, put our finger on exactly the things that went wrong. That’s the type of performance where you want to make changes as a coach. We’re going to figure out what we’ve got to do.”
Mississippi State (10-9, 2-4) has a lot of figure out itself, having lost four straight games after winning six in a row overall — including its first two conference games.
The Bulldogs are coming off an 88-68 defeat to Texas A&M on Wednesday, but Mississippi State coach Chris Jans said he promised his players, “I’m not going to get discouraged by (the losing streak).”
“It’s a challenge,” he added. “What I just talked about with them is I’m going to do what I do and try to do the best job I can for them individually and certainly as a team, to put them in the best position to win the next game — just like we’ve done since we arrived.”
Jans said the performance against the Aggies surprised him because the players had worked hard and practiced well in preparation for the game.
“I’m going to keep my nose to the grindstone and keep trying to tinker with this and that,” Jans said. “I say this a lot, I get it: The bottom line is winning, losing. I understand that more than anybody. But I told them the expectation would be the same for them on an individual basis and as a program (to continue working hard and practicing well).”
Mississippi State’s slide has coincided with a slump by leading scorer Josh Hubbard, who averages 21.7 points per game. He has shot 33.9 percent from the floor during the losing streak and has just 12 and 13 points, respectively, in the last two games.
Tyler Tanner averages a team-high 17.1 points per game for Vanderbilt, and Duke Miles contributes 16.6.
–Field Level Media
