John Calipari reaffirms faith in Arkansas players despite loss to Ole Miss

Despite an 0-2 start in the SEC, John Calipari still has belief in his team at Arkansas.

Calipari spoke about the Razorbacks following their 73-66 loss to No. 23 Ole Miss on Wednesday. He knows that they’ll be fine moving forward although having lost the past two games in conference play.

“Like I said, I have a lot of faith in this group,” Calipari said. “I’m disappointed. I’m not discouraged.”

With that, Calipari also forgave some of that league start considering the competition this year in the Southeastern Conference. Still, that’s not going to change with more ranked matchups to come for the ‘Hogs.

“This league is really good. You’re going to take knocks. It’s just how it is. I was hoping we could get this game and, but, we didn’t so now we move on,” Calipari said. “Tomorrow will be our day for us. Friday, I’ll work on the next opponent.”

Arkansas is now 11-4 overall this season in its debut year under Calipari. The new-look roster there has had good wins against Miami and Michigan, although having to come back from double-digit deficits in both, but have also suffered early losses to almost all of their better competition in No. 8 Baylor, Illinois, No. 1 Tennessee, and No. 23 Ole Miss.

Again, it’s not getting any easier for the Razorbacks with them needing to improve to keep pace in conference play. That starts with being a better unit as a whole – much like Calipari said the Rebels were last night.

“We’re the type of team – we got a good team. But everybody’s got to play well. All nine got to give us something. They don’t have to play out of their minds but they can’t play poorly and you can’t have three play poorly or four or one not give you anything. We’re going to have to play better as a group,” said Calipari. “Right now, we got to get better at how we’re trying to play. Some of it’s talking them through, showing them tape. Some of it will be drilling them on what we’re doing and why. But, you know, we’ve just got to play winning basketball and that means collectively.”