OXFORD, Miss. — It will be too easy for some of the national talking heads to say Ole Miss held on for a 78-76 win over Tennessee.
That’s only partially correct.
While the Volunteers’ Igor Milicic did butter-finger a layup at the buzzer that would have sent the game into overtime, Ole Miss was defending.
Jaemyn Brakefield, who scored all of his game-high 19 points in the second half, was on him closely. He backed off to avoid a foul, but the Vols’ big man lost focus and an ugly layup bounced away.
It started a celebration. Even the fans played it smart, not coming on the SJB Pavilion court until Tennessee cleared the floor.
The Rebels got a bucket from Jaemyn Brakefield with 7.8 seconds left for an Ole Miss lead that had been a back-forth fight most of the second half. Neither team could really break away.
At the end it came down to who was going to make the last shot and that was Brakefield. Then it was up to Ole Miss on the other end of the floor to nail down a win — or at least avoid going to overtime.
They managed that and ended up breaking a three-game losing streak in the final home game of the year Wednesday night. They’ll finish the season on the road at Florida on Saturday.
Brakefield led Ole Miss with 19 points. Malik Dia and Dre Davis each had 13 (along with 10 rebounds for a double-double) and Sean Pedulla added a dozen.
