It stood to reason that after Saturday's emotionally draining win over ranked Michigan, these young Hogs would suffer a bit of a letdown. But, man, that first half was some letdown - the Hogs shot just 4 of 27 from the field before intermission. The eyesore that was the first 20 minutes prompted these two tweets, the first from Wally Hall and the second from Hawgs Illustrated (presumably written by Dudley Dawson):
That may have been the ugliest half of basketball in the history of Bud Walton Arena. Hogs shooting 14.8 percent from floor.
Over my 30 years covering Arkansas hoops, I have seen some really bad halves of basketball. This tops them all for both teams.
Fortunately, the Razorbacks were a good deal better in the second half (they shot 56 percent from the field in that time) but they never could put Auburn away, and the Tigers missed a last-second shot that would have sent the game into overtime.
B.J. Young led the way with 11 points (included in that total was a vicious dunk that he threw down with 20 seconds to play), and Rickey Scott (8 points) and Rashad Madden (10 points) had some big baskets in the second half. Not the easiest game to watch, but I'm not going to make too much of it. These guys are young, and they're undermanned: nights like this are going to happen. But they're also talented, and they're tough-minded: we've got some fun games ahead of us as well.
Let's get ready for the Crimson Tide.