STARKVILLE — I.J. Ready was true to his last name.
Catching a pass from teammate Fred Thomas with 47 seconds left Saturday, the Mississippi State men’s basketball team’s point guard took a deep breath and fired a tie-breaking 3-pointer. Forty seconds later, Ready added two free throws to preserve a 57-54 win against Vanderbilt at Humphrey Coliseum. The win was MSU’s first in the Southeastern Conference this season.
“That’s a shot we take every day in practice,” said Ready, who scored MSU’s final five points. “On that play we have a big man diving and then the ball comes to me. If the defense takes the dive and doesn’t step out on me, the coaches have told me to take that shot with confidence. That’s what I did.”
Ready’s five-point stretch in the final minute capped a terrific second half win that saw MSU rally from a 26-18 half deficit. The key stretch was a 14-0 run early in the second half that turned a 35-28 deficit into a 42-35 lead.
“I thought in the second half, our pressure really bothered them,” said MSU coach Rick Ray, whose team improved to 8-9 and 1-3 in the SEC. “Our defensive pressure led to long rebounds and easy shots on the other end, so once we started defending that way, we started to turn the game in our direction.”
The run was MSU’s longest of the season and helped it overcome a sluggish first half. Junior guard Fred Thomas, who had all 10 of his points in the second half, said the key was MSU’s offensive approach.
“We started sharing the ball,” Thomas said. “When we share the ball, we can be one of the best teams in the SEC. When we share the ball like we did today, we are a completely different team.”
Ready led MSU with 11 points, but all but one MSU player scored, and seven Bulldogs scored more than five points. Senior forward Roquez Johnson and junior guard Craig Sword had eight points, while junior forward Gavin Ware had seven. Ware also had a game-high 13 rebounds to help MSU dominate (41-28) in that category.
“Gavin can get every rebound that comes off the glass when he’s playing like that,” Ready said.
The second-half surge was a breath of fresh air for MSU, which scored 47 points in two of its previous three games. The win also snapped a 16-game SEC losing streak, a run that dated to Jan. 22 of last season when MSU beat Auburn at home.
MSU limited Vanderbilt to 38.5 percent shooting, including an 11-of-29 performance in the second half that ultimately sank the Commodores.
“It’s disappointing,” said Vanderbilt coach Kevin Stallings, whose team fell to 11-6 and 1-3. “I thought they were the aggressor and they played more physically and harder than we did, even when we were winning. We turned the ball over, they got offensive rebounds. We didn’t do anything particularly well. They deserved to win.”
For Ray, rebounding and free throws stood out from the other statistics.
“One big stat in basketball is if you make more free throws than your opponent attempts, you’re going to win that game,” said Ray, whose team was 20 of 27 from the free-throw line. Vanderbilt was 9 of 17. “Between that and our rebounding advantage, I thought those were the stories of the game.”
The story in the first half was a sluggish effort that saw Ready, a sophomore point guard from Little Rock, Arkansas, commit six turnovers.
But Ready attacked the rim in the second half and took care of the basketball. He scoring seven points in the final 20 minutes and committed only one turnover. He also had five rebounds and two assists in 30 minutes.
“We were aggressive, but it was a smart aggressive,” Ready said. “In the first half, we were playing hard but playing to go in there and shoot. In the second half, our aggressiveness was in penetrating and then passing the ball. Once we started sharing the ball, we started playing better.”
Ware, a former standout at Starkville High, also had a strong game. He scored six points in the run that turned the tide. Ware said the season-high crowd of 6,568 at Humphrey Coliseum was huge.
“The crowd made a big difference,” Ware said.
Ray agreed.
“I want to acknowledge our fans,” Ray said. “The fans were excited, especially our student body. I thought their enthusiasm really helped get us through some tough times.”
One such tough time was late in the second half, when two free throws by Riley LaChance tied it at 52 in the final minute and set the stage for Ready’s big minute.
“I knew the shot would be there,” Ray said of Ready’s dagger. “I’m glad he didn’t hesitate. I wanted him to just shoot it. He did what we wanted.”
LaChance, Vanderbilt’s second-leading scorer, was held to 12 points, prompting Stallings to say, “They had Riley figured out. We need other guys to step up when that happens.”
Forward Damian Jones led the Commodores with 21 points and eight rebounds.
n Notes: Freshman forward Oliver Black had his best game in recent weeks, scoring six points and grabbing seven rebounds, including six and six in the first half. “I didn’t know I was going to play that many minutes,” said Black, a freshman from Jackson. “I just had to step in there and play hard. My coaches trusted me to get the job done.” … On a day when two of MSU’s starters — Thomas and forward Travis Daniels — were sideline early with foul trouble, the bench delivered, outscoring Vanderbilt 18-12. “They played harder than we did,” Stallings said. “Their bench outscored ours. Their bigs outrebounded ours. … They did everything they needed to do to win.” … MSU’s win also included a blast from the past at halftime, as the program celebrated Alumni Day for the third-straight year. At halftime, 24 former Bulldogs were recognized, including program legends Darryl Wilson and Marcus Bullard, the starting backcourt for MSU’s 1996 Final Four team. Former All-SEC players Tony Watts, Greg Carter, and Chuck Evans and NBA Hall of Famer Bailey Howell, the school’s all-time leading scorer, also were on hand. “I’m glad to see those guys back. It’s important to have them here,” Ray said. “I don’t just want them here for a big weekend like this. We want them around our program as much as possible.”
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brandon Walker on Twitter @BWonStateBeat
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