Chris Beard on strength of SEC: ‘We’re living it’

After starting off the season 15-2, Ole Miss has hit a bit of a lull in SEC play, dropping three of its last four. All four losses have come against ranked teams.

That’s the unfortunate reality of playing in the SEC this year. There are no gimmes.

After a 92-82 loss to Auburn over the weekend, Ole Miss coach Chris Beard was asked how much the SEC is helping prepare his team for the postseason, given how tough things have been on a night-in, night-out basis.

“Certainly right now just got beat by Auburn, so not really thinking about the league, but yes, your question’s got a statement in there too,” Beard said. “I think that’s well-documented. Everything has been talked about with the SEC. We’re living it. So are you guys. You’re here every night too.”

Ole Miss is one of a handful of teams that has had a complete logjam of ranked opponents. Starting with a road win over No. 4 Alabama, Ole Miss is currently going through a stretch that features six ranked opponents in seven games.

There are no two ways around it in this year’s SEC.

“The league’s really good,” Beard said. “I think Auburn’s worthy of their current No. 1 ranking. You know, we’ve won this game a few times over the years. So we understood what it was going to take tonight. Our guys were going to have to play really hard and believe they could win, and we did. Mission accomplished. And then we were going to have to play well. And tonight just some things that we could have controlled better that we didn’t get done. Then what do teams like Auburn do? They make you pay. They make big shots in big moments. They make big plays in big moments.”

Auburn is the only team in the league that has yet to take an SEC loss. Alabama sits close behind with one loss. Missouri has two, then there are a whole slew of teams with three or more.

Many of them are legitimate top NCAA Tournament teams, too.

Ole Miss believes it’s one of them. And there will be the need to prove that over the coming weeks in SEC play, at least if you want quality seeding in the Big Dance.

“I think our team has the ability to do that,” Beard said. “You know, it’s early February. I think we can play with teams like this right now. I know we can. So we’ll just keep working towards where we can beat teams like this in March.”