Mississippi State Basketball vs. Florida: Highlights, final score, and more

The Mississippi State basketball team defeated the Florida Gators in overtime on Thursday afternoon, 69-68.

The Mississippi State basketball team led for most of the first half, but let the Florida Gators come back and send the game to overtime. The Mississippi State Bulldogs managed to come away with a win today, and that is truly all that matters.

Here are my early post-game thoughts:

This game should not have gone into overtime, but it did due to a poor 2nd half-performance.

It is unfortunate that this game entered overtime because the Mississippi State basketball team led by 12 at the end of the first half.

Tolu Smith working the Florida big men down low won the game.

Tolu Smith had a big game down low. For most of the game, the Mississippi State Bulldogs found ways to get Tolu Smith the ball, and he managed to do a lot of work down low on the Florida big men. Smith finished the game with 28 points which was his career high as a Mississippi State Bulldog.

The Mississippi State Bulldogs have to work on crucial situation passing.

In crucial moments, the Mississippi State basketball team could not manage to hold onto the ball and make the right passes to the right person. If the Mississippi State basketball team wants to compete in the NCAA Tournament, they must figure this out.

Was this win enough to put the Mississippi State basketball team in the NCAA Tournament?

Well, I think so. It looks as if today’s win was enough, according to multiple bracketologists, to push Mississippi State into the Big Dance. I expect to see the Bulldogs land around an 8 or 9 seed entering the NCAA Tournament.

The Mississippi State Bulldogs will face Alabama on Friday at 12:00 p.m. CT/1:00 p.m. ET in the Quarterfinals of the SEC Tournament.