ARKANSAS 89,
PITTSBURG STATE 66
FAYETTEVILLE -- It took Arkansas a while to get the Gorillas off its back.
It was a lot longer than expected for a Razorbacks basketball team picked to finish third in the SEC taking on an NCAA Division II squad.
Arkansas finally started pulling away in the second half and beat the Pittsburg (Kan.) State Gorillas 89-66 in an exhibition game Thursday night in Walton Arena before an announced crowd of 4,228.
It was the final exhibition for the Razorbacks, who open the regular season against Alabama State at 4 p.m. Sunday in Walton Arena.
"It wasn't a thing of beauty, but at the same time, there's never been an ugly win, so we'll take it," Arkansas Coach Mike Anderson said. "I thought the second half was much better than the first half.
"The first half we came out and got off to a real, real slow start. I thought the energy level was not there, but we had some guys that came off the bench and really picked it up."
Arkansas got 37 points from its bench, including 13 each from sophomore center Moses Kingsley and junior forward Jacorey Williams.
The Razorbacks led the Gorillas 60-50 with 13:32 left after Pittsburg State freshman guard Dakota Jones hit a 16-foot jump shot.
Arkansas then outscored Pittsburg State 11-0 over a 3:16 span -- including six points by Kingsley -- to push Arkansas' lead to 70-50 with 9:55 left.
Kingsley highlighted the run with a dunk to finish a fast break and also had a blocked shot.
"I thought Moses was very instrumental in the second half," Anderson said. "You could just see the fire come alive in him, and he kind of woke up the building, too."
Thursday night's game featured 58 fouls -- 29 called on each team -- and 71 free throws. The Razorbacks hit 26 of 42 free throws while the Gorillas hit 24 of 29.
"When you shoot that many free throws, it really disrupts the rhythm of the game," Anderson said. "But let's give Pittsburg State some credit. They came in and really did a good job of attacking us.
"It wasn't until the second half until we started doing a much better job of limiting them to one shot and taking advantage of our size. I thought was started attacking the basket a lot more."
Sophomore forward Bobby Portis led Arkansas with 22 points and 5 rebounds in 20 minutes. He hit 6 of 8 field goal attempts and 10 of 14 free throws.
Junior forward Michael Qualls, who played 27 minutes, had 5 rebounds, 3 steals and 2 assists and hit 3 of 5 three-point attempts.
Williams hit 6 of 9 shots and had 4 assists and 2 rebounds in 16 minutes. Kingsley was 4 of 4 on field goal attempts and 5 of 6 on free throws with 3 rebounds in 14 minutes.
Arkansas junior guard Anthon Bell scored eight points and senior guard Ky Madden and freshman guard Anton Beard each scored seven.
"The game was more slow tonight," Qualls said. "It was hard to get in a groove.
"We had to grind it out. More of a free throw shooting competition, but we fought our way through it."
Junior guard Jabril Durham was scoreless in 12 minutes before fouling out, but he led the Razorbacks with 4 assists and had 2 steals while taking 1 shot.
Durham transferred to Arkansas from Seminole (Okla.) State Community College.
"Jabril has got to learn at this level, the arm bar, the hand check, they're going to call that," Anderson said. "But I'm glad to see he's trying to focus on his defense. Now he's just got to clean it up, as well as our whole team.
"We can't put a team on the line 29 or 30 times in a game. It's still a learning process for this team."
Anderson said the Razorbacks also need to shot better than 61.9 percent from the free throw line as they did Thursday night.
"You've got to shoot free throws better than we shot them," Anderson said. "That's not going to cut it with the schedule we have."
Senior guard Devon Branch led Pittsburg State with 20 points and nine rebounds. Sophomore Josiah Gustafson added 12 points.
Gorillas junior guard Jake Bullard hit two free throws with 29 seconds left in the first half to cut Arkansas' halftime lead to 46-39.
Arkansas shot 53.1 percent from the field in the first half (17 of 32), but the Gorillas were within seven points because they hit 14 of 17 free throws and 5 of 10 three-pointers while out-rebounding Arkansas 18-14.
"The first half wasn't up to par, wasn't up to our standards," Anderson said. "So we'll have some discussions about that."
Arkansas shot 49.2 percent from the field (30 of 61) and outrebounded Pittsburg State 37-28 while outscoring the Gorillas 17-4 on second-chance points..
The Razorbacks scored 26 points off 25 Pittsburg State turnovers
Sports on 11/14/2014