FAYETTEVILLE -- It's a reach to say Mike Anderson was upset with the defensive effort of his Arkansas Razorbacks against Ole Miss.
In fact, it seems a safe bet that the reaching upset him the most with given Anderson's rueful recall of some loose balls that he said his Razorbacks didn't reach because they merely reached for them during their 96-82 loss Saturday night at Walton Arena.
"Those loose balls that we saw on the floor, we can't reach for them," Anderson said. "We have got to throw our bodies down and come up with them."
Anderson gave the Ole Miss Rebels their due. They nailed some incredible shots, hitting a blazing 74 percent from the field in the first half, and the Arkansas coach said so right after the game and said so again Monday and Tuesday.
But too often, Anderson said, he saw breakdowns that enabled the Rebels to get in position to launch those shots and find the open man and to score way too easily at the rim.
"It's about toughness," Anderson said. "Just making the extra effort -- rebounding, the offside guy sticking his nose in there, diving for loose balls, the hard traps, being able to rotate. The mental toughness you have to have."
Because he physically isn't as big and foreboding, nor during games as bellicose as Nolan Richardson, his mentor whom Anderson assisted for 17 years at Arkansas, it's easy for some to underestimate Anderson's passion for the game. Especially in defeat.
He is not Nolan Richardson and doesn't make the mistake of trying to be somebody other than himself.
However, it was Richardson who saw so much of himself in Anderson that the junior college coach elevated Anderson from junior college with him to Tulsa. Richardson brought Tulsa star Paul Pressey and others from his 1980 national championship team at Western Texas Junior College, but Anderson played for rival Jefferson (Ala.) State Junior College. The coach so admired Anderson's toughness against his old team that he signed him to his new team.
The "he will fight you until the General is dead" description that Richardson used so often about Corey Beck, his point guard for the Razorbacks' 1994 national championship team, Richardson said often in 1981 when Anderson was on point helping Tulsa win the NIT.
Whether or not Arkansas prevails Thursday night in its next SEC game against Alabama at Walton Arena, expect the Razorbacks to finish the game with more floor burns after diving for loose balls than they accumulated last Saturday against Ole Miss. Especially after Anderson promised Monday night on his radio show a Razorbacks effort Thursday night to match the effort of the announced 18,352 who attended the Ole Miss game despite the 8:30 p.m. tip-off.
"It was a great crowd and that was the most disappointing part, that we couldn't pull out the win," Anderson said. "I want everybody to know you guys did your part. Now give us a chance to do ours."
Sports on 01/21/2015