Mississippi State at Ole Miss Men’s Basketball Preview

The Mississippi State Bulldogs Men’s Basketball team heads to Oxford to take on the Ole Miss Rebels this Saturday. It’s the first of two meetings between the teams, and here’s all the info you need to know.

Broadcast Information

• Television: SEC Network
• Radio: Mississippi State Radio Network
• Time: 3:30 p.m.

Records and Rankings

Mississippi State

• Record: 13-1 (1-0 SEC, tied for 2nd)
• RPI: 52 (as of Thursday morning)
• AP Ranking: Not Ranked

Ole Miss

• Record: 8-6 (1-1 SEC, tied for 6th)
• RPI: 152 (as of Thursday morning)
• AP Ranking: Not Ranked

Projected Starting Lineups

Mississippi State

• Quinndary Weatherspoon
• Nick Weatherspoon
• Tyson Carter
• Aric Holman
• Abdul Ado

Ole Miss

• Markel Crawford
• Deandre Burnett
• Devontae Shuler
• Justas Furmanavicius
• Domink Olejniczak

Things to Watch For

• A consistent lineup and looking for consistency: The Bulldogs are 13-1 and playing well. It’s no surprise that the lineup has been pretty much the same for almost every game as a result. Ole Miss is struggling and looking for anything that will work, so it isn’t a surprise they have used multiple lineups this season. Markel Crawford has started 13 games for the Rebels but no one else has started more than 10.
• Three Point Shooting Woes: Neither team has done much from behind the arc this season. Mississippi State is shooting 30.7% from three point range. Ole Miss is only slightly better at 34.3%. If either team gets hot from long range in this game, it would be one of the few times it has happened all season.
• Can the Rebels keep up on the glass: Mississippi State has done an outstanding job out rebounding their opponents all season long. The Bulldogs get six more rebounds than their opponents on average. On the other hand, Ole Miss has been outrebounded by .6 rebounds a game.
• One team is feasting while the other is famishing: Neither team had a very stout out-of-conference schedule before they went to conference play. Mississippi State has the 246th toughest schedule, and Ole Miss has the 215th toughest schedule. The difference is Mississippi State handled their opponents with relative ease, while Ole Miss has struggled to beat just about everybody.

Prediction

The basketball series between these two teams has been lopsided in favor of Ole Miss in recent years. Ben Howland won one meeting his first season as Mississippi State’s coach, but there has been a growing sense, the series will eventually shift back in favor of the Bulldogs with the talent Howland has been accumulating.

I think this shifting of the tide will start on Saturday. The Rebels just aren’t good and Mississippi State is playing as well as it has in years. Winning in Oxford has never been easy, but I think the Bulldogs pull this one out 76-65.