Monk’s 23 points not enough in 65-51 loss to Florida
FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas junior Malica Monk had a Herculean effort, but a cold third quarter sunk the Razorbacks as they fell to Florida 65-51 in Southeastern Conference action in Bud Walton Arena on Thursday.
Florida went on runs of 9-0, 7-0 and 10-0 to start each of the respective quarters and Arkansas struggled to come from behind. A renewed effort in the fourth quarter helped Arkansas cut the lead to nine but that would be as close as the Razorbacks would get.
Monk scored 23 points and grabbed eight rebounds to pace Arkansas (11-8, 2-4 SEC) but the Gators (9-10, 1-5 SEC) dominated the third period, 18-7, for the win. Seven third period points ties the school record for fewest points in the third stanza.
The Gators lead the SEC in 3-point field goals per game and lived up to the billing hitting seven shots from beyond the arc. In addition, Florida’s size in the paint hurt Arkansas as the Razorbacks gave up 36 points inside and allowed 54 rebounds in the game.
Notes
• Malica Monk scored 20+ points eight times in her career — all this season.
• Malica Monk’s eight rebounds was one shy of tying her career high.
• Arkansas used just the third different starting lineup of the year with junior transfer Raven Northcross-Baker starting for an injured Devin Cosper.
• Arkansas was perfect from the line, but it was a season-low 4-for-4 effort.
• The Razorbacks forced 14 Florida turnovers and committed just eight in the game.
Up Next
The Razorbacks play their next two games on the road traveling to No. 11 Missouri on Sunday and facing No. 10 South Carolina in the Gamecocks’ home gym on Thursday.
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Mike’s seat not hot, but it is starting to smolder
You’re not going to hear from this corner that Mike Anderson has a problem.
At least yet.
It’s college basketball and having a 2-4 record in the SEC isn’t cause for a full-blown fire alarm. With 12 conference games (plus an out-of-conference matchup with Oklahoma State), there’s plenty of time to put out the smoldering ashes.
But Arkansas does have to go 7-5 down the stretch just to get to .500.
And nobody knows if that’s enough to make life comfortable for Anderson. That still wouldn’t give him 20 wins on a season that most were expecting to be much better than that.
Yes, things have gotten to that point.
Losing to Florida on Wednesday night wouldn’t be that big of a deal except the Gators came in struggling offensively, without much support down low and Arkansas had hopes.
That was until KeVaughn Allen, the Little Rock native, suddenly found his shooting touch against his home state team he spurned a few years ago.
In a strange way, you had to figure that would be what would happen. He was the Gators’ leading scorer last year and hadn’t hit double figures this season.
Allen scored 28 points, easily his highest output of the season. Florida students held up large pieces of paper spelling out “shooters shoot” to remind Allen he needed to be aggressive.
“I saw that,” Allen said later. “It was funny to me.”
Arkansas didn’t appear too surprised.
“He came out locked in to shoot the ball,” said Razorbacks guard Jaylen Barford, who scored a team-high 28 points. “He was just scoring left and right.”
Afterwards, Anderson remained calm and analytical, which is usually the way he is regardless of how big the game is or what the outcome is.
“That was not good defense,” Anderson said. “KeVaughn shot lights out. Jalen Hudson shot lights out. And the rest was history.”
Unfortunately that has been the history for this team too often in the past three weeks.
And it won’t get any easier.
Ole Miss comes in Saturday afternoon and they’ve won in Fayetteville before.
Bit now the Hogs will be playing a little short-handed more than likely.
Trey Thompson went down in the first half with a hamstring injury and Anton Beard left with a gruesome-looking ankle injury also went out early.
Those are two key players.
Now Anderson has to find an answer for that and figure out some way to get a win without those two key players. No one has officially ruled them out, but expecting either of them to be ready in three days might be too much for even the most optimistic.
Somehow, Anderson’s going to have to figure out a way to get some wins … quickly.
Or that smoldering may turn into a small blaze.
With at least a couple of prominent boosters already beginning a push to try and lure Texas Tech coach Chris Beard to Fayetteville now is the time Anderson needs to stop the fire from growing.
Which will require some wins.
And, as we said, quickly.
