ATLANTA — Arkansas is not only tall, but thick and experienced on its front line.

Yet the all-senior group had been outplayed too many times as the Razorbacks wobbled down the stretch in SEC play.

The Razorbacks’ big men appeared to have a distinct advantage on the blocks heading into Friday’s game against No. 18 Vanderbilt, and did they ever show it. Darian Townes led the party in the paint with 18 points and seven rebounds, and the Razorbacks roughed up the thinner Commodores in an 81-75 victory in an SEC quarterfinal game.

Arkansas outrebounded the Commodores 45-24 and outscored Vanderbilt 50-20 in the paint.

“It all came down to toughness,” said Townes, who had five of Arkansas’ 22 offensive rebounds.

“We just got beaten badly on the boards, and we gave them way too many second opportunities and third opportunities and fourth opportunities,” Vanderbilt Coach Kevin Stallings said. “They just pounded us on the boards.” No Arkansas player had more than seven rebounds, but a bunch of guys had a handful or more. The Razorbacks had more offensive rebounds (22 ) than Vanderbilt did defensive rebounds (18 ).

Townes, Steven Hill, Charles Thomas, Vincent Hunter and Michael Washington combined to shoot 16 of 28 from the field for 36 points and gathered in 25 rebounds.

For a Vanderbilt team that had freshman A. J. Ogilvy in the post and Ross Neltner running at power forward, the Hogs were overpowering.

“Ogilvy is a great offensive player, but you know, he’s a freshman and defense is one of the things he lacks,” said Thomas, who made 5 of 10 shots and had 13 points and 6 rebounds. “We wanted to try to expose it, get on the boards, just outhustle them and outtough them.” The Razorbacks’ low-post players had been struggling, particularly on the road, in recent games.

“We had a terrible run there with opposing power forwards going against us,” Arkansas Coach John Pelphrey said. “We don’t expect to lose in the front court. Worst case, we should break even with our guys.” It was a mismatch this time.

“That’s one thing we know they don’t have, depth in the front court, and we tried to expose that,” Arkansas swingman Sonny Weems said.

Weems had another off game with only three points, but his teammates picked up the slack.

“We knew we had some other guys that could hurt them,” Arkansas assistant Rob Evans said. “Our guys did a good job of finding the guys that we should have gotten the ball to.

“ We knew we had to make sure we got the basketball inside. We were trying to get to the free-throw line, but we didn’t think we were going to get there for a while. We knew we were bigger than their guys inside and we could score on them.” Townes and Thomas combined to go 5 of 7 from the freethrow line, where the Razorbacks have struggled. Thomas went 3 of 4 on free throws after hitting just 2 of 6 in the season finale against Auburn.

“I’m happy about it, but I’m happier to get the win,” Thomas said.

A resurgent Thomas could be an X-factor in Arkansas ’ postseason plans. He had gone 10 games without scoring 10 or more points, then scored 10 and 13 points in the past two games.

“I thought [Thomas ] did a very good job of being a big, strong base down in the post and making strong moves, as opposed to the seizures sometimes we see him have with the basketball,” Pelphrey said.

“[The low-post play ] turned out in our favor,” Arkansas guard Patrick Beverley said. “It could have been more times we did it, too. It’s showing the world that we’re not a one- or two-man team.”