Chris Jans says Mississippi State's senior night played out like a 'glorified pickup game'

Tuesday night was senior night for Mississippi State as they took on South Carolina in their final game of the season. Bulldogs head coach Chris Jans spoke earlier in the week about the unpredictable nature of senior nights during his coaching career and believed that there was some truth to his statement following his teams’ 74-68 win over the Gamecocks.

“You never know, you can’t gauge what’s going on in people’s minds,” Jans said. “If we didn’t have that talent we wouldn’t be sitting here, I don’t know, that’s something you have to ask the players but certainly the game didn’t unfold the way we wanted it to. I mean it was like a glorified pickup game in terms of the offense.”

There was no shortage of offense in this one, as the Gamecocks shot 44.2% from the field and Mississippi State made an even more impressive 50% of their shot attempts. The Bulldogs dominated the paint, scoring 20 of their 26 made baskets in the interior despite struggling early on the defensive end of the floor.

“Both teams were scoring at will and that was frustrating I’m sure for both coaching staffs. I love how we were clicking on the offensive end, but we just didn’t seem as engaged. Getting into the ball, we weren’t dictating, we weren’t getting any deflections, and a lot of that is because how well South Carolina played,” Jans said. “I mean we knew going in that they were a different feeling, looking basketball team than they were seven games ago when we played them in Columbia.”

The Bulldogs defeated the Gamecocks 66-51 in their last matchup, but South Carolina has played their best basketball since then, securing two of their three conference victories and playing in a handful of close games versus good competition.

“We told our guys, we showed our guys that they’ve gotten better, they’ve continued to improve, they’re in better shape, they are guarding better and you saw it. I mean they are a better basketball team, they’re a dangerous basketball team right now they can beat a lot of teams in our league, a week ago they had Alabama in overtime. And they played well, they played really really well and fortunately there in the second half our defense finally took hold and got some turnovers that turned into offense,” Jans said.

South Carolina may be improved, but they couldn’t handle the red-hot Bulldogs, who have won eight of their last ten games following a 1-7 start to conference play. Mississippi State has secured a first-round bye in the SEC Tournament and still have a strong chance to make the NCAA Tournament, as they face Vanderbilt this Saturday in their regular season finale.