BURN THE HORSE
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Pondering how much I’d like to see a UALR-Middle Tennessee Sun Belt Conference Tournament championship in a couple of weeks while compiling today’s Burn The Horse UALR Rewind.
Keys to victory
TURN, TURN, TURN: What was the difference between UALR’s victory at Louisiana-Lafayette on Thursday and loss at Middle Tennessee on Saturday? Turnovers. UALR had 15 turnovers to Middle Tennessee’s 14 on Saturday. And Middle Tennessee held a 17-11 advantage in points off turnovers. Five by Courtney Jackson hurt. Grade: C-.
ALARM CLOCK: UALR got off to a good start and didn’t let Middle Tennessee run away with the game. Grade: A.
DON’T SETTLE After shooting just 10 three-pointers in 45 minutes against Louisiana-Lafayette on Thursday, UALR shot 18 on Saturday. They made 8 to shoot 44 percent, which is good. But UALR settled for far too many shots outside the paint in the first half. Grade: B-.
FREE MONEY: Middle Tennessee only outscored UALR 12-10 in free throws. That would have been OK except that Middle Tennessee had 27 attempts to UALR’s 12. UALR didn’t get to the line nearly enough to be effective: Grade: F.
Vegas, baby.
UALR was a 12.5-point underdog and lost by eight. That made those betting on UALR a winner.
Predictions
Everyone was a winner though most favored a much more lopsided score.
Always negative
63.4: Middle Tennessee’s field-goal percentage. You just can’t win when allowing opponents to put up a number like that.
Keep it positive
2: Number of second-chance points by Middle Tennessee.
Stat of the game
19: First-half points by Middle Tennessee’s LaRon Dendy. UALR did a better job on Dendy in the second half, but Dendy single-handedly put the Blue Raiders on his back in the first half.
Player of the game
Will Neighbour finished with 22 points and 5 rebounds. He made 8 of 11 field goals including 3 of 6 three-pointers. It’s the best we’ve seen Neighbour since his shoulder injury at Denver.
Up next
UALR gets Isiah Thomas and Florida International on Thursday at the Jack Stephens Center.
