Valuing the basketball leads to top 10 win for Bulldogs on Thursday night

Sam Purcell and Destiney McPhaul sat frustrated in Mississippi State’s postgame press conference following a 95-68 beatdown to No. 2 South Carolina last weekend.

It was a game that somehow showed State’s potential but also the massive flaws it had to overcome all in the same 40 minutes. The latter played out for the majority of the ball game as the Bulldogs went from leading by 11 points early in the first half to losing by 27.

The giant elephant in the room was persistent turnovers and Purcell and McPhaul called it out without hesitation. The Bulldogs finished the game with 20 turnovers and South Carolina took advantage, scoring 23 points off of those on the way to the blowout win.

The same part of the basketball game that caused a rout in one top 10 game brought triumph to the Bulldogs on Thursday night. Purcell’s team valued the basketball against the No. 10 Oklahoma Sooners and would use its defensive pressure to overtake the visitors in a 81-77 victory.

“The first quarter of South Carolina showed you the team that you could be. But when those turnovers occurred and we didn’t score, we lost focus and played home run ball. Home run ball equals ugly basketball,” Purcell said.

“We talked about where we could attack (Oklahoma) knowing what kind of ball screen coverage they were going to do. Because we stayed focus for four quarters is the reason we got a top 10 win.”

State takes care of the ball and forces mistakes on defense to lead to win

Both teams had been prone to turnovers all year long but the Bulldogs were the ones that would protect the ball the best in this game. State averages 17 turnovers a game but had just 11 on Thursday for the second lowest total of the season.

Conversely, the Bulldogs forced Oklahoma into 21 turnovers. It counteracted what the Sooners were able to do most of the night on the offensive end and allowed the Bulldogs to overcome some cold shooting for most of the game.

Most importantly, State found a way to get a win after facing tough moments in blowout losses to No. 15 Kentucky and No. 2 South Carolina. It showed the team’s willingness to fight back.

“We were tested the first two games. We’ve got to learn to put four quarters together as a team and we did that,” McPhaul said. “We trusted in what we’ve been through as a team. We haven’t faced that much adversity this year, but we were able to get through it.”

Thursday night could have gone differently for the Bulldogs had they had a mindset of accepting their fate. In the loss against the Gamecocks, State watched as an 11-point first half lead faded and they went 10 minutes without scoring a field goal from midway in the first half into the second half.

A 14-point lead in the first half faded in the same way as the Sooners were able to go on a 19-2 run and close the game to one point at the half. The Sooners then took the lead in the second half, but this time State had resolve.

Jerkaila Jordan was at the forefront of that as she showed her All-SEC potential scoring 18 of her 24 points in the second half. Jordan had 12 points alone in the fourth quarter as she finished strong and Purcell had given her credit for the second half turnaround based on her conversation with him in the locker room.

Her leadership was the difference. She was not deterred by the ranking in front of the Sooners’ name.

“No pressure. They tie their shoes just like we tie our shoes,” Jordan said. “We went out there and played them like a regular team – they just so happened to be top 10. This gives us momentum. We put that behind us and we’re taking it one game at a time. We’re going to use this momentum going into Sunday.”

The grind continues with difficult SEC slate

For Purcell, there was no huge celebration postgame. This was the coach’s second top 10 win of his young career and he got one a season ago against the defending national champions of LSU around this same time on the schedule.

The lack of pomp and circumstance is due to the fact that Purcell remembers what happened after that victory when the Bulldogs struggled down the stretch of the season and missed out on the NCAA Tournament. There’s still work to be done in this gauntlet of the schedule and grind continues on Friday as the team prepares to take the road this weekend at Georgia.

“You’ve got to stay together and you’ve got to believe,” Purcell said. “If we’re going to sit here and cry and point fingers and not focus, then what are we doing? I thought they were focused on each other and played for each other and that was why we were able to get the game done in four quarters.”