The Ole Miss Men’s Basketball lost to Vanderbilt in overtime 89-86 at home on Tuesday, March 3 in their penultimate regular-season.
First half
The Rebels started off well with a James Scott dunk and Ilias Kamardine 3-pointer. Malik Dia chucked up a 3-pointer that Vanderbilt answered with a 3-pointer of their own. Vanderbilt kept snatching offensive rebounds and even got a three-on-one possession.
Despite this, Ole Miss started the game on a 10-3 run. Ole Miss stuffed many of the Commodores’ layup and dunk attempts at the rim.
A Kamardine steal countered an Ole Miss turnover, which led to a fastbreak dunk attempt. Despite Kamardine missing, Corey Chest slammed the ball back into the net. Travis Perry continued the scoring onslaught by adding on a 3-pointer to extend the Ole Miss lead to 15-3.
With a 17-6 lead, one of the interesting scoring developments was that even with 17 points, no player had hit more than one shot. Ole Miss was playing strong across the board to begin the game.
Ole Miss played well on the defensive side of the ball. They forced multiple turnovers in the first and contested shots very well with multiple blocks.
Several back-to-back, sloppy turnovers led to fastbreak points for the Commodores. This brought the deficit to only three points, with Ole Miss leading 26-23. Vanderbilt tied the game 27-27 off of yet another sloppy turnover by the Rebels.
Vanderbilt took the lead off of a Tyler Tanner 3-pointer, but Travis Perry answered back with one of his own. Perry got fouled on a 3-point attempt and hit the subsequent free throws to put Ole Miss up 35-33. At the very end of the half, Pinkins was fouled in a scramble under the basket and shot two free throws. This ended the half 37-33.
Kamardine and Perry were the two main contributors for the Rebels in the first half. They had 10 and nine points respectively. Kamardine added on five rebounds, as well. Tanner carried the Commodores with 14 points of his own off of 66% shooting.
While Ole Miss led at the half, it was not pretty. They had nine turnovers as a team, which Vanderbilt did not capitalize on nearly enough. The Commodores had 36 shot attempts while Ole Miss only had 25 attempts. Even with the extra 11 attempts, Vanderbilt only made one more shot than the Rebels.
Second Half
Klafke started the second half with an and-one attempt on a pullup midrange jump shot but he missed the free throw. However, a Vanderbilt defender snuck up behind AJ Storr on an ensuing possession and stole the ball, which led to a Commodore 3-pointer.
Pinkins countered with his own 3-pointer and shot two free throws on the next possession to put Ole Miss ahead 48-42 after four minutes.
The sloppy turnovers continued for the Rebels when it appeared Kamardine just completely lost focus of the ball and Tanner pickpocketed him, then scored on the fastbreak.
The game divulged into chaos for about two minutes with turnovers galore, multiple missed layups and plainly basketball that looked straight out of the local rec center or YMCA rather than an SEC showdown.
Storr had a great play where he drew a foul and hit the and-one to put the Rebels up 60-54 with about nine minutes left in the game. After a Vanderbilt free throw, Storr went back to the line and hit both attempts, increasing the lead again.
With about a minute left in the game and Ole Miss up by one, Dia had a huge layup and-one that helped give the Rebels a more comfortable four-point lead. Vanderbilt answered almost immediately with two midrange jumpers to tie the game at 74 points apiece.
Overtime
While Ole Miss won the tipoff, Vanderbilt immediately stole the ball from Kamardine and got an-and-one layup. They extended their lead to four points after a minute of overtime.
Chest was able to bring the game back within two points with a tip-in off of a missed Storr shot, but Vanderbilt responded with an and-one layup of their own to increase their lead in the game to 84-79.
Storr missed his jumper, but Chest was there again to slam down the putback. Vanderbilt did not give an inch of ground and hit a 3-pointer to push their lead to 87-83.
Pinkins and Kamardine were able to hit both three out of four free throws to bring the game within one. With under 20 seconds in the game and leading 87-86 Vanderbilt went to inbound the ball and immediately got fouled to give the Rebels a chance.
Unfortunately, the Rebels had a chance but missed the shot, which Vanderbilt recovered and dribbled down the court to run out time. The Rebels went 2-10 from the field during overtime to contribute to the loss.
Despite leading for much of the game, Ole Miss just ran out of luck, or gas, in the final few minutes.
Pinkins finished the game as the Rebels’ leading scorer with 16 points, while Kamardine and Storr each had 14.
What’s Next?
Ole Miss has their final regular season game against South Carolina Saturday, March 7 in The Sandy and John Black Pavilion at noon. SEC Network will broadcast the game.
Wilson Engeriser is a junior public policy leadership and rhetoric double major on the pre-law track from Fairhope, Ala. He is a Sports Staff Writer for The Daily Mississippian. He is involved around campus and in his free time he enjoys hiking, traveling and playing pickleball. He is also a huge Eagles and Bears fan.
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