Arkansas head coach Eric Musselman reveals key to Arkansas tournament win, previews Texas A&M matchup

The Arkansas Razorbacks are one of the hottest teams in college basketball and on Friday afternoon, they continued to remain on a tear, defeating LSU 79-67 in the quarterfinals of the SEC Tournament. Following the big win, Arkansas head coach Eric Musselman spoke with ESPN’s Marty Smith on the court. The Razorbacks’ head man spoke about why they were able to pull away with a win today. “You know, I thought that little run at the end of the first half, Chris Lykes gave us a jolt of energy. And then we came out with that 13-1 run to start the second half. We made a few adjustments offensively that I thought opened up the floor for us a little bit more. Obviously, we shot the ball so much better in the second half.”

Arkansas had three players score 18 points or more in the winning effort, JD Notae, Chris Lykes, and Au’Diese Toney. Their head coach said having so many players being able to contribute is really valuable. “Yeah, I think it’s really important that we have ball distribution,” Musselman said. The ball’s gotta have eyes. At times today, we still got a little sticky with the ball. But defensively and offensively, I thought we played pretty good on both sides of the ball.”

The next opponent for the Razorbacks in the SEC Tournament semifinals on Saturday will be the Texas A&M Aggies, led by head coach Buzz Williams. In looking forward to his next opponent, Arkansas’ head coach had nothing by words of praise for the Aggies and their head man. “Well, I’ve gotta study them obviously but Coach Williams does a great job. Buzz is one of the best coaches in the nation. They play really, really hard. We have tremendous respect for them. There’s a reason they’re still alive and it’s because of their competitive nature.”

Notae scored 19 points, Lykes poured in 18 points, and Toney stuffed the stat sheet with 22 points and 10 rebounds in today’s win for the Razorbacks.