'Iron Sharpens Iron!' Tolu Smith Praises Jimmy Bell Jr.

Mississippi State men's basketball forward Tolu Smith illustrates the "luxury" of sharing the floor with Jimmy Bell Jr.

Mississippi State forward Jimmy Bell Jr. is one of the many offseason additions to the Bulldogs basketball team, but he was quickly given a much bigger role after highly-touted Tolu Smith's injury on Oct. 5. Bell was a major factor in the Bulldogs' successful start to the season while Smith was recovering, as he even took home the SEC Player of the Week honor on Dec. 26.

However, Smith returned on Dec. 31 and in Mississippi State's small sample size of two games since then, he's averaged 14.5 points and 6.5 rebounds. Bell's also played well despite a small decrease in his minutes, and Smith looks forward to sharing the floor with him for the rest of the season.

"It is a luxury," Smith said on Monday's edition of Dawg Talk. "There's no letup for the other team's big man, and at the end of the day, iron sharpens iron. If you want to get the best out of somebody, you have to go against the best and I think Jimmy makes me better and I make him better. We go at it day in and day out and the results will show. It's been a great few weeks of coming back and working out with him."

The Bulldogs unfortunately broke their five-game win streak against South Carolina in the SEC opener on Jan. 6, but Smith believes Bell's size and athleticism will help Mississippi State against the rest of the conference.

"He's a really physical guy with a big body," Smith said. "He's somebody that has real touch and real game. Being able to play him and defend against him makes it easier for me to play against the guys in the SEC. At the end of the day, there aren't a lot of players with his size and his kind of footwork, so like I said iron sharpens iron. It makes me better and our team better."

The Smith-Bell tandem will need to play at perhaps an all-time high in Mississippi State's next matchup against No. 5 Tennessee on Wednesday.

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