The #23 Arkansas Razorbacks Men’s basketball team hosted the #16 Tennessee Volunteers on Saturday in front of another packed crowd inside Bud Walton Arena. The game featured two teams playing really good basketball and poised to make some noise in March. Tennessee entered the game coming off of an impressive win over a very good Kentucky team on Tuesday 76-63 in Knoxville. From the opening tip, both teams were stingy on defense and that was the story in the first half. Arkansas had a one point lead at the half leading 24-23. It felt like the first team who scored 50 points first would likely win the game and that’s exactly how it played out. JD Notae, star point guard for Arkansas and the SEC’s leading scorer was held in check in the first half with only 8 points. Just like the Alabama game , Notae had to sit a large part of the first half with two early fouls. He would eventually foul out late in the game with under 3 minutes left finishing with 13 points.
Tennessee was in position to win most of the game but Arkansas was able to pull away late. Like he has basically all season, Jaylin Williams made his presence felt scoring 13 points and collecting a whopping 16 rebounds while also drawing 4 charging fouls. Both teams were cold from the field. Tennessee shot 27.1 percent and Arkansas shot 30.5 percent. With the win, Arkansas improved to 21-6 overall and 10-4 in the SEC. Tennessee fell to 19-7 and 10-4 in the SEC. After losing their first 3 conference games, Arkansas has now won 10 of their last 11 SEC matchups. Tennessee will travel to Missouri on Tuesday. Arkansas will travel to Gainesville on Tuesday to take on the Florida Gators who are coming off a huge home win against the #2 Auburn Tigers 63-62. Arkansas has not won in Gainesville since 1995.
