Chris Jans calls Rob Dillingham a special player: "Just put 'scorer' above his mantle."

Rob Dillingham just gets buckets. You know it. I know it. The entire college basketball world knows it. Mississippi State head coach Chris Jans definitely knows it, too.

Jans watched Dillingham drop 16 points (an admittedly “light” performance, all things considered) when the Bulldogs lost to Kentucky 90-77 at Rupp Arena back in mid-January. Seven of those points came in a four-minute span, which, again, is nothing close to the supernova explosions we’ve seen from Dillingham in recent weeks.

But it does speak to Dillingham’s season-long microwave-scoring tendencies. Don’t let him get rolling. There might not be a better offensive player in all of college basketball when Dillingham goes on a heater. He finds ways to put the ball in the hoop.

“Dillingham is a special player. You just put ‘scorer’ above his mantle. That’s what he does,” Jans said during his Monday press conference. “He’s not a one-trick pony. He can do it in a lot of different ways. He can go both directions. He can stop on a dime, pull up from 3, pull up from 2. He’s very, very quick. He’s fast.

“But even though he has all those great athletic attributes, he does it under control. You never feel like he’s out of control when he gets downhill, when he pulls up — from going at a pretty good speed and he pulls up and shoots it. It’s really, really hard to guard.”

The rest of the Southeastern Conference would emphatically agree. Dillingham is Kentucky’s second-leading scorer during SEC play at 16.4 points in only 24 minutes per contest — all while coming off the bench. The 6-foot-2 freshman guard is doing this on insane shooting splits of 51/44.6/73.2. That’s rather unexpected for someone known to toss up a lot of tough shots.

Dillingham has produced outputs of 35 points (Tennessee), 23 points (Missouri), 23 points (at LSU), 20 points (Florida), and 20 points (at Vanderbilt) since the start of 2024. 21 of his 23 points in the buzzer-beating loss to LSU came in the final 10 minutes of action, including what could have been the game-winner.

“He’s one of those guys that can change the game quickly. He can go on a run,” Jans added. “In a lot of their games when it gets to be hard, when it gets to be down the stretch in close games, not every time, but the ball’s in his hands a lot. They run stuff for him. They’ve got a lot of potential ‘go-to’ guys but he’s definitely one of them when it gets really, really hard. And he does it without starting. I don’t think he’s started all year long for the most part.”

But Dillingham might not be the one that Jans is even most concerned about in Kentucky’s backcourt. That title likely belongs to Antonio Reeves, an All-American candidate who could very well win SEC Player of the Year. Reeves absolutely torched Mississippi State in the first matchup last month, lighting up the Bulldogs for 27 points on 8-12 shooting and a perfect 9-9 mark from the stripe.

Reeves has hit at least 22 points in three straight games now for the Wildcats. He’s up to 20.9 points per game against SEC competition on splits of 48.6/43.8/90.2. The progression of his game from even just a few months ago to now is thrusting him into the NBA Draft conversation.

“Reeves obviously is one of the best players in the league,” Jans said. “He’s played well against a lot of teams. Got a lot of respect for his game. From what I can read and see and hear is, he’s a hard worker and is really — from an outside looking in — he’s a guy that’s gotten better each and every year and you can tell he’s put the time in. Everybody respects that.”

All this praise goes without mentioning the likes of DJ Wagner and Reed Sheppard, the latter of whom is a lock to make the All-SEC Freshman Team. That’s four high-level guards at John Calipari’s disposal. Three of them are playing arguably their best basketball of the season. The fourth — Wagner — should only get better as he continues to recover from his lingering ankle injury.

Those four combined to drop 59 of Kentucky’s 90 points the last time these two teams met. Jans will have his hands full once again for round two on Tuesday night. Tipoff between MSU and UK in Starkville is set for 7:00 p.m. EST on ESPN.