STARKVILLE — As freshman guard Rickea Jackson helped herself off the floor, junior guard Andra Espinoza-Hunter let out an exacerbated yell.
“Come on!” Espinoza-Hunter exclaimed as she helped Jackson off the floor after the latter finished through contact and a whistle for two of her 24 points on the night.
Flashing the rugged offensive ability to finish in and around the rim mixed with a dynamic baseline jumper, Jackson capped off her second straight 20-point outing as she carried the Bulldogs (20-3, 8-1 SEC) to a 67-53 win over Georgia (12-10, 3-6 SEC) Monday at Humphrey Coliseum.
“It was a matter of me just knocking it down,” Jackson said of finding her stroke after a 3-for-10 start. “When my teammates give me the ball and have confidence in me it gives me confidence to keep shooting.”
“She plays like a guard and can score at all three levels,” Georgia coach Joni Taylor added. “You run out to her, she goes by you; you don’t she can shoot it and she rebounds. And then on their dribble-drive, when you’re switching it she ends up on smaller guards and she can just raise up and shoot over them. She’s really, really good. Hard assignment for us defensively.”
Affording their opponents a slow start eerily reminiscent of MSU’s stagnant opening frame against Auburn last week, the maroon and white-clad Bulldogs finished the first quarter just 4 of 19 from the field while being out-rebounded 14-9.
Following another lackadaisical first 10 minutes, MSU responded to the tune of a 13-0 run to open the second quarter. With a Jackson layup and a free throw from sophomore center Jessika Carter, sophomore guard Xaria Wiggins — whose proved an energetic offensive talent off the bench over the past two weeks — notched a 3-pointer from the wing to stretch the Bulldogs’ lead to seven.
Prolific second quarter in tow, the Bulldogs further distanced themselves as Jackson and Carter — who earned her eighth double-double of the season with a 15-point, 11-rebound effort — combined for 15 of MSU’s 22 third quarter points on 7-of-10 shooting.
“We’ve just been able to win when it hasn’t been our best,” MSU coach Vic Schaefer said. “Tonight’s first quarter wasn’t our best. But man that second quarter was really good, that third quarter wasn’t too bad.”
While Jackson and Carter shouldered the offensive load, it was a lowly shooting night for the rest of MSU’s roster. Of the 10 other players that saw the floor against Georgia, only junior Chloe Bibby, sophomore Myah Taylor and Wiggins hit two or more shots as the rest of the Bulldogs combined for 11 of 34 shooting.
“You can’t coast in the SEC,” Schaefer said. “You’re not getting by anybody, you’re not getting a shot on anybody. You have got to understand there is a level and a speed of the game that if you’re not at it, it’s going to be hard for you.”
Beyond the offensive outputs, Monday offered a far cleaner ball-handling effort than MSU has enjoyed over the past month. After averaging 13.6 turnovers their last five games, the Bulldogs recorded just nine turnovers against their red and white counterparts — marking the first time since a Nov. 30 loss to Stanford in the Greater Victoria Invitational MSU finished with single-digit turnovers in a game.
Notably, it was a heady effort from Taylor who backed up a dismal outing against Auburn with seven points, three rebounds and three assists to just two turnovers Monday.
“I turned the ball over a lot against Auburn,” she conceded postgame. “So my focus was to come into this game and be better and to learn from it and I think that’s what I did. I still have a lot to work on but I’m going to continue to watch film and continue to see what’s open.”
With the victory, Schaefer’s bunch now hits a stretch of three-straight games against ranked opponents, starting Thursday in Knoxville against No. 23 Tennessee — a place MSU has won just twice in program history. And though the Bulldogs have won six of their past seven games against the Volunteers, MSU faces minimal practice time as they’ll play three games in the next six days.
“It’ll be a little bit of a challenge for this group but I know they’ll be excited about going and playing (at Tennessee) on Thursday — they better be,” Schaefer said. “Because I know they’re probably going to be ready for us in what should be a great game.”
Ben Portnoy reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @bportnoy15.
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