Khalif Battle made a lot of Arkansas basketball fans happy on Saturday. More importantly, he made his coach happy.
Battle scored 42 points – the second most ever by an Arkansas player in an SEC game (Todd Day vs LSU, 1992) – and led the Razorbacks to an 88-73 win over Missouri on Saturday. The win provided Arkansas a season sweep of their Battle Line rivals, back-to-back victories for the first time since late December and an above-.500 record for the first time in a couple weeks.
Razorbacks head man Eric Musselman had praised Battle’s play in recent weeks, probably not coincidentally about the time Arkansas picked up its play. On Saturday after the game, Musselman was especially glowing.
“That’s about as a great an offensive performance as a guy can have,” Musselman said.
Arkansas is 4-3 in its last seven games – a record that should be 5-2, Musselman pointed out – and the coach is not about to give up on what the rest of the season, and even the postseason, may hold.
Here’s what Musselman had to say about all of it after Saturday’s record game.