Mississippi State takes on the #20 Texas A&M Aggies tonight in a matchup of soon-to-be SEC foes. But the Bulldogs need to recover from a loss to Akron last week, and they’re going to have to figure out how to do it with Renardo Sidney in the lineup. After his team’s loss to Mississippi State, South Alabama coach Ronnie Arrow said the Bulldogs are better off with Sidney on the sidelines. “They’re a very explosive team, especially without Sidney in there,” Arrow said. “They’re much quicker, and they get up the court really well. They played with a lot of confidence without him.”

Sidney Returns to the Bulldogs Lineup Tonight Against Texas A&M

Even Rick Stansbury acknowledges that Sidney has a ways to go in terms of conditioning. An even more telling statistic is the fact that Stansbury sat Sidney during crucial points of a close game against EKU and a loss against Akron. Sidney sat for the final 4:39 of the EKU win and the final 4:29 of the Akron loss. His coach doesn’t trust him in the clutch.

Mississippi State was a far more efficient team in Sidney’s absence. According to statsheet.com, The Bulldogs offensive efficiency ratings (the number of points a team would score over 100 possessions) are as follows:

• Eastern Kentucky — 108.6
• Akron — 85.3
• South Alabama — 119.4

With a smaller lineup, the Bulldogs were able to play a faster tempo against South Alabama. They used a 19-0 run to take over the game in the first half. While guard play was a huge factor, big man Arnett Moultrie finished the game with 28 points and 13 rebounds. MSU obviously needs an inside factor, but with each passing game, it appears they should (will?) rely on Moultrie and not Sidney.

In the two games that Sidney has played in thus far, he is averaging 10.5 points and four rebounds per game. While two games is not a large enough sample size to make a conclusion on Sidney’s impact, it is concerning that he is not progressing in light of his reported weight loss and conditioning improvements.

Will tonight be the night that Sidney breaks out with a good game? Or should we all prepare for more wheezing up and down the court and wasting away on the bench in the clutch? Mississippi State must learn to play with Sidney in the lineup because he is too talented not to play. And with a national TV audience tuned in on ESPN2 to watch the drama unfold, there’s no better time than the present.

Brian Joyce (333 Posts)

Brian Joyce is an advanced metrics enthusiast, college hoops junkie, and writer for the SEC basketball microsite for Rush the Court.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 17th, 2011 at 1:05 pm by Brian Joyce and is filed under microsites, sec. Tagged: arnett moultrie, renardo sidney, rick stansbury. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.