Chris Beard bluntly addresses free throw disparity between Ole Miss, Texas A&M

Texas A&M used a furious finish to take down Ole Miss 63-62 on Wednesday night despite trailing for virtually the entire game. But there was one element of the loss for the Rebels that did not sit well with coach Chris Beard.

His team shot only four free throws in the entire contest.

“I’m not going to comment on that tonight,” Beard said when asked about the discrepancy. “I would just say that it’s two physical teams playing. It was really hard to understand and comprehend from where I was sitting that we played 16, 17 minutes of SEC basketball and there’s only one foul on the opponent.”

In defense of the officials, the calls seemed relatively consistent both ways in terms of quantity. Texas A&M shot only nine free throws in the game, so it wasn’t like the disparity was huge. But in a tight game, any little thing can make the difference.

Beard was left scratching his head at how Texas A&M, given its style of play, was able to get away without a whistle so many times.

“A lot of what they do is iso ball, one guy has the ball, everybody’s spaced out, so there’s not a lot of nights where you see the foul on the ball,” Beard explained. “But there’s a lot of action and a lot of physicality going on off the ball. So we’ll have to study the tape and see.”

Bottom line: The low foul numbers were at least partially a factor. Still, Ole Miss had its chances to win the game in other ways. The Rebels simply came up empty.

And for his part, Chris Beard didn’t really blame the refs, either. He mostly just noted the numbers.

“These are the best officials in college basketball, period,” Beard said. “So it’s never about that. But it was a puzzling stat. Opponent can come in here and play physical and tough, that’s their identity, that’s who they are. Their coach will tell you that more than I can. So no fouls off the ball, 17 minutes in an SEC game. That was puzzling, to say the least.”