The clock has struck midnight for the Ole Miss men’s basketball team, but not without a valiant effort in the SEC Tournament. After winning three straight postseason matchups in a last-ditch effort to earn a bid to the Big Dance, the Rebels had the door slammed on them in a 93-90 overtime loss to Arkansas.
Ole Miss battled through foul trouble and put its best foot forward in an extended five minutes of action. A rare missed free-throw by SEC Player of the Year Darius Acuff Jr. set up the potential for a knockout punch by the Rebels. AJ Storr, with three seconds on the overtime clock, let a deep 3-pointer fly. The ball bounced off the front iron, and the Razorbacks were able to advance to the conference title game.
The postseason run by Ole Miss (15-20) inevitably spurred the “What if?” question, given that Chris Beard’s bunch looked like a completely different team than what it displayed during the regular campaign. Ole Miss lost five regular-season conference games either by one score or in overtime. The Rebels entered the postseason tournament as the No. 15 seed with a 4-14 SEC record.
If three or four of those earlier losses had ended with an inverse result on the scoreboard, the run would have likely been enough to make Ole Miss NCAA Tournament-bound for the second straight year, but instead, the push was ultimately rendered an exercise in futility.
No. 3 seed Arkansas (25-8) was led by four stellar performances on Saturday. Meleek Thomas had a game-high 29 points, while Acuff put 24 on the scoreboard in what was a challenging outing for the sensational guard. Trevon Brazile and Malique Ewin, a former Ole Miss forward, were dominant down low, posting double-doubles. Brazile had 16 points and 10 rebounds, while Ewin logged 14 points and 13 boards.
Ole Miss was led by Storr’s 24-point outing. Malik Dia, Patton Pinkins, and Ilias Kamardine combined for a complementary 44 points in the swan song. Both Pinkins and Kamardine fouled out late in the matchup, as the Rebels struggled with an unfavorable whistle in the second half.
The Rebels got on top first with a James Scorr dunk, kickstarting a series of jams in the game. A Billy Richmond III dunk gave Arkansas a 4-2 lead with 18:01 on the clock, marking the first deficit Ole Miss faced in this year’s SEC Tournament. The slams continued for John Calipari’s Razorbacks, which found and exploited a soft spot in the Ole Miss paint defense. 12 of Arkansas’ first 23 points came off of dunks, and the Razorbacks led by 11 with 10:45 remaining until the intermission.
An 11-4 Ole Miss run over a 3-minute stint allowed the Rebels to cut the deficit to four points at the 7:14 mark. Storr later hit a jumper and a triple to get his team within one point of Arkansas with just under five minutes on the first half clock. The Razorbacks rebuilt a seven-point advantage and seemed to be pulling away until a heroic sequence by Pinkins made the game much more interesting.
Pinkins hit a fastbreak triple at the 1:44 mark, and later drew a foul while heaving a last-second 3-pointer. He made all three of his free shots to put Ole Miss within one point of its conference counterpart at the midway break. Arkansas’ halftime lead was 37-36.
The Rebels took an early second-half lead, courtesy of a fastbreak layup by Dia. Momentum was promptly squashed by Ole Miss picking up four fouls in the first two minutes of action, which proved very costly down the stretch. Still, the Rebels battled through foul trouble and went toe-to-toe with the higher-seeded opponent.
A Travis Perry 3-pointer at the 15:50 mark found Ole Miss up 47-44. Over the next six minutes, both teams rallied, with the lead being exchanged multiple times. Arkansas broke through the gridlock with a 12-2 run to build a 10-point buffer with 5:43 on the clock. A pair of dunks by Ewin, one of which was off a bad-pass turnover committed by Perry, fueled the Razorback rally.
A three-point play by Pinkins, followed by a Perry triple, worked Ole Miss back within four points of its foe. Pinkins hit a 3-pointer with 3:40 left in regulation to make it a one-score game. Acuff rebutted with a three-point play and a deep shot. Arkansas led 78-71 at the 2:38 mark of the second half. Ole Miss went on a 6-0 run over the next two minutes to make things interesting.
Thomas, who had a hot hand for the Razorbacks all afternoon, had a crucial miss at the free-throw line, leaving the door open for Ole Miss to make a move while trailing by two points with just under six seconds on the clock. The Rebels did just that, with Storr quickly getting to the basket, knocking down a layup that sent the game to overtime.
A short-handed Ole Miss squad lacking its floor general, Kamardine, who fouled out late in the second half, led a commendable effort in the final frame. The Rebels had a viable shot at stealing victory from the jaws of defeat, but ran out of magic, missing out on their first opportunity to win a conference title since 2013. Arkansas will play Vanderbilt in the SEC championship on Sunday at 12 p.m. CT.
Free-throw shooting and rebounding were the ultimate determining factors of the game. Arkansas more than doubled Ole Miss in attempts at the charity stripe. The Razorbacks were 23-31, while the Rebels were 11-14 at the line. The board battle favored Arkansas by 13 rebounds. The Razorbacks were especially effective on the offensive glass, with 16 boards and a whopping 25 second-chance points.
With the loss, the 2025-26 season comes to an end for Ole Miss, as the Rebels have no prospects of drawing an NCAA Tournament or NIT bid. Beard and company will now look to rebuild a roster losing key assets — most notably Dia and Storr — through the transfer portal in the offseason. Ole Miss basketball will return in November.
