FAYETTEVILLE -- With Daryl Macon making them like never before as a Razorback, a surging Arkansas defeated the Ole Miss Rebels 98-80 Saturday at Walton Arena.
Macon, the high scoring first-year junior-college-transfer guard and Little Rock Parkiew grad, previously had 23 points as his Razorback best. He scored 30 points against the Rebels, hitting six of eight treys, in the Razorbacks' third consecutive victory. Arkansas is 20-7 overall, 9-5 in the Southeastern Conference, before Wednesday night's home game against Texas A&M.
Jaylen Barford, Macon's fellow junior-college-transfer guard, scored 15 while junior two-year letterman guard Anton Beard scored 11.
Up front, Arkansas coach Mike Anderson had hoped his excellent 6-10 center, Moses Kingsley, would neutralize excellent Ole Miss center Sebastian Saiz.
With help from junior big man Trey Thompson, Kingsley did far more than merely neutralize Saiz. They swamped him.
Kingsley doubled-doubled with 14 points and 13 rebounds and blocked 4 shots.
Thompson, eight points, seven rebounds and three blocked shots, alone bettered Saiz, eight points shooting just 2 of 13 with five rebounds.
Ole Miss (16-11, 7-7) got huge scoring efforts from guards Deandre Burnett, 27 points, and Terence Davis, 21 points.
The Rebels also had a big night on the free-throw line, 20 of 27, but Arkansas achieved a bigger one, 24 of 27.
Paced by Macon's 15 first-half points, Arkansas led 46-37 at intermission
Ole Miss led three times in the first half, the last at 10-9, surpassed by two Dustin Thomas free throws and a Thompson dunk.
After it was cut to 13-12, a Beard three gave Arkansas breathing room, 16-12.
A Macon layup gave Arkansas its biggest first-half lead, 41-29.
The Rebels closed within seven before Macon beat the buzzer with a driving layup for the 46-37 halftime advantage.
Beard had a crowd-inspiring diving loose-ball tip leading to Dusty Hannahs' basket while hitting two threes for six points and dishing two assists. Thompson, with three blocked shots, three rebounds and a dunk in nine minutes, played the last 4:14 of the half after Kingsley sat with two fouls.
Macon hit three of Arkansas' six first-half threes.
Barford opened the second half with a trey for a 12-point lead, but Ole Miss whittled it to five (56-51) as the Hogs went scoreless for three minutes.
A Watkins steal setting up a Thompson dunk broke the drought and opened the floodgates at 15:37. By 12:03 Thompson's jumper had the Hogs up 20.
Sports on 02/19/2017