Razorbacks' Defending Arc Big Part of Turnaround in Run

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Arkansas' improving three-point defense is a mystery.

Nobody, especially coach Eric Musselman, really has a clue what changed.

"I don’t know when the light bulb came on other than just getting three-balls drained on us on a nightly basis early in the year,” Musselman said Monday afternoon. “We did just keep talking to the team that we’re doing the same drills that we (did) when we led the nation (in three-point defense)."

JD Notae made it sound pretty simple Monday.

"We don’t want nobody to get anything easy," he said. "We just take pride in getting stops. I feel like that’s where that came from."

Musselman, who probably doesn't want to go back and think about earlier in the season, at times seems to wonder what took them so long to figure it out.

"I don’t know what’s so hard about it," he said.

Part of it is not worrying about stopping everybody inside. That's what the Hogs did against Kentucky, giving up 30 to Oscar Tshiebwe down low, but not letting that beat them.

"I mentioned (after) the Florida and the Kentucky game that we were willing to maybe concede some inside points and some paint points and not concede the three, just based on how the flow of the game was going," Musselman said. "We thought if Kentucky started making three's that would be a little bit too much to make up. We felt the same way on the road against Florida.

"So we got a little closer to the three-point shooters, and we stopped digging in the post. I think all those things kind of contribute to numbers when you (look at) certain aspects of your defense."

Now it's got to work a couple of more games.

A win over LSU on Wednesday night and Saturday at Tennessee really don't mean a whole lot in the pecking order.

The Hogs have clinched one of the top four spots in the league, but they are still in the mix for the regular-season title.

More importantly, they will be in the NCAA Tournament.

Musselman and his staff want to win every game ... but the SEC Tournament next week really means absolutely nothing.

Remember, when the Hogs won a national title Kentucky beat them by 12 in the semifinals of the SEC Tournament over at the Pyramid in Memphis.

Coaches want to win every game their teams play. Winning the SEC regular season would be a big deal. So would taking the league tournament in Tampa would, too, even though for the Hogs that's less important.

But a loss now isn't the end of the world.

The guess is Musselman is thinking about the tournament that starts in a couple of weeks. Surviving and advancing in that one is the ultimate goal.

It should be for fans, too.

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