The Standard

Issue date: 12/4/07 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Matt Moore

A long, athletic Arkansas squad made it a tough and frustrating outing for the Missouri State men's basketball team Monday night.

Forcing 23 Bears turnovers, Arkansas used a key second half stretch to run past the Bears 70-51 in Fayetteville, Ark.

Bears head coach Barry Hinson said that he expected more out of his team despite the Razorbacks size advantage

"I thought they played extremely well and I was disappointed with the way we played," Hinson said in his postgame radio show. "They're definitely big and athletic but we got out of our gameplan. We went into jump shooting mode and our guards didn't shoot that well. We can't win when that happens."

The Bears hung with the Razorbacks early, even leading 10-4 and 13-10 during the first 10 minutes. Eventually, Arkansas' superior athleticism took over.

Leading 36-31 at halftime and 41-36 four minutes into the second half, the Razorbacks ripped off a 14-4 run to put away the Bears.

"Two years ago we came in here and trailed by 13 at halftime," Hinson said. "We only trailed by five at the half this time, so I was expecting a better second half performance."

It got more ugly as the game continued. Going back to the first half when the Bears held a six-point, Arkansas scored 65 of the game's next 95 points.

Not helping the Bears chances any was senior forward Deven Mitchell picking up his second foul of the game with 13:36 remaining, forcing him to sit out the remainder of the first half.

Mitchell's frustrations boiled over in the second half. With the Bears trailing 48-40, Mitchell was given a technical foul as he said something to a referee after Shane Laurie had been whistled for a foul.

Hinson said he disagreed with the referee's decision to give Mitchell a technical foul.

"I couldn't believe it," Hinson said. "No profanity was said and I asked the ref about it but never really got an answer. You just have to deal with stuff like that on the road and know you're not going to get that many calls."

The Bears burned Arkansas' full-court press early on, jumping out to a 10-4 lead.

But the Razorbacks caught up with the Bears and took the lead at the 6:14 mark on a Sonny Weems' dunk that forced a Bears timeout. Missouri State never led again.

Michael Washington and Gary Ervin tied for the game-high in points with 12 each. Washington added nine rebounds and five blocks.

For the Bears, Mitchell had 12 points and five steals. Chris Cooks scored 11 points and Drew Richards had eight points and grabbed seven rebounds.

Bears freshman guard Lamont Austin saw his first collegiate action and didn't score in 11 minutes played.

Arkansas, who had averaged seven steals per game coming into Monday night, had 12 in the first half and finished with 16.

Missouri State returns to Hammons Student Center tomorrow night, hosting Texas-Pan American at 7.

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