State skates by Vanderbilt; losing skid at five

NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Vanderbilt’s Aaron Nesmith missed a 3, and Mississippi State’s Aric Holman ripped down the rebound. MSU’s Reggie Perry streaked to the other basket. Holman whipped a pass in his direction, Perry laid it in without a Commodore remotely close and State led 57-39 lead with 8:05 left.

Vanderbilt called time out. Some fans made their way to the exits as scattered boos were heard in Memorial Gymnasium

When the clock hit zero minutes later, 24th-ranked Mississippi State had a 71-55 win, though it seemed worse than that, probably because VU is now 0-and-5 in the Southeastern Conference and 9-8 overall.

Two months ago, that outcome was one no one would have dreamt possible. Not in their worst nightmares.

And this one felt like a nightmare from the opening tip.

Much to blame—again—was poor shooting; 36.7 percent from the floor, 26.3 percent on 3s and a woeful 53.8 percent from the foul line.

As were senseless mistakes. Vanderbilt was out-scored 18-2 on points off turnovers, too many of those leading to easy fast-break buckets for State.

The Commodores challenged here and there, but never led, and rarely played well enough, long enough, that victory seemed realistic.

After trailing by 15 earlier in the first half, VU whittled the lead down in the closing seconds of the period. Saben Lee (13 points) drove to the hoop, hit a shot, and got fouled. Lee missed the foul shot, Matthew Moyer tipped it in, and the ‘Dores went to the locker room down 35-27.

It seemed worse than that; especially with a 2-for-19 start from the field fresh on everyone's mind. But somehow the door remained cracked, and 56 seconds into the second half, the Bulldogs seemed to inadvertently kick it open a little more.

MSU point guard Lamar Peters was whistled for a foul on a failed steal attempt. Peters stomped his foot in protest and was whistled for a technical foul.

But as was the case all night, Vanderbilt strung nothing together. Nesmith hit just one of the two shots and then Yanni Wetzell turned it over on the possession.

MSU's Abdul Ado hit a pair of free throws, Nesmith converted a drive along the baseline, and Moyer came up with a terrific block of Perry. Nesmith grabbed the rebound and fed Joe Toye for a short made field goal in traffic as he was fouled by Quinndary Weatherspoon, who had a game-high 17 points.

But Toye missed the ensuing free throw and the Bulldogs' Tyson Carter answered with a 3. Nesmith again responded with a tough drive through traffic, but Perry converted a lay-up and Vanderbilt never got within single digits again.

MSU sprinted out to a 10-0 lead before Vanderbilt called a time out just 3:36 in. Finally, Vanderbilt got its first points on a tip-in from Wetzell at the 15:50 mark.

Before that, Vandy missed its first eight shots from the field, and two free throws for good measure.

“I was really pleased with the first five possessions. We had three really good looks at the rim, two really good looks from 3, and zero points to show for it,” Vandy coach Bryce Drew said.

Vanderbilt stays home to face a one-loss Tennessee team at 6 on Wednesday, Jan. 23.

The Bulldogs are an excellent offensive rebounding team, collecting offensive boards at a 35.2 percent rate, which ranks 23rd in the country. MSU corralled 10 of 32 on Saturday, a 31.2 percent mark.

Vanderbilt also held MSU to an effective field goal mark of 50.0 percent, which is 5.7 percentage points below its season average.

While some of the defensive numbers were respectable, one wonders how much State had things on cruise control, because the Commodores never were able to challenge for long.

And at times, Vanderbilt didn't seem willing to put out the effort it needed to challenge MSU, either. There were too many open-court turnovers or missed that led to easy buckets on the other end. and too many easy lay-ups in MSU's half-court offense.

It wasn't the kind of effort you'd want to put on tape, and while Drew remained positive in his post-game press conference, the fact that Toye, Simi Shittu and Matt Ryan didn't start the second half probably revealed a lot about Drew's private thoughts.

In fact, the Commodores got almost nothing from the latter two. Ryan (minus-14 in 14 minutes) hit one shot and Shittu got five of his seven points in the final 1:06.

Drew and Nesmith mentioned that the Commodores got good looks at times, but couldn't hit them. There may be something to that, but Vandy's six assists to 14 turnovers says a lot about the team's inability to generate efficient offense in the half court. There was plenty of blame to go around as seven 'Dores had turnovers.

Nobody played that well, and Aaron Nesmith's minus-14 in 35 minutes suggests he wasn't great, either. But the freshman again seemed, outside of the Commodores' ability to get to the foul line, like Vandy's only hope of generating points. Nesmith had 11 of them in 35 minutes and tied Lee for a team-high six rebounds.

VU started Lee, Nesmith, Ryan, Toye and Shittu for the third straight game.

Wetzell, Moyer and Evans started the second half in place of Toye, Shittu and Ryan.

Ryan hit a 3 with 7:24 left in the first half, extending VU’s streak of games with a made 3-pointer to 1,048.

Shittu hit the first 3 of his career with about a minute left.