HONOLULU — The LSU Tigers basketball team first-half express again came out of the game charging building an insurmountable lead and then used two last minute three-pointers by Torris Bright to seal the deal and win the championship over Fresno State, 95-85, in the Sports Tours International Hawaii Thanksgiving Classic Sunday at the Blaisdell Center Arena.
The win in the championship game is the first for LSU in a regular season tournament since the Dec. 1988 Chaminade Classic, also in Honolulu.
LSU survived a game-long barrage of three-pointers by Travis Robinson and Terrence Roberson of Fresno State and used the finishing flourish by Bright to get the win. It puts LSU at 5-0 for the first time since the 1992-93 season, the last winning season for the LSU basketball team.
Stromile Swift, who scored 19 points in the championship game and 73 for the tournament, was named the Most Valuable Player of the event by officials and media covering the tournament. Also named to the all-tournament team from LSU were Jabari Smith and Bright. Smith led LSU with 26 points and Bright had 21 to add to the Tigers scoring totals.
“It is the first championship and I hope it’s not the last,” said Swift after the game. “We just wanted to come out and play hard and win the championship. We wanted to play hard defense and be aggressive. We tried to take them out of their game and get them into a little bit of foul trouble. Torris did a great job making his free throws and drawing a lot of fouls. We are capable of playing like this. It’s all about execution.”
“It’s good that the best player in the tournament gets the MVP and he certainly was. He demonstrated that. He played well in our first two games, but in these three games he really came into his own, ” said LSU Coach John Brady. “If he keeps playing like that along with Jabari Smith, those two guys are really good players. I’ve got to take my hat off to Torris Bright. Brian
Beshara and Jermaine Williams. All of those guys deserve some compliments because of the way they played.”
Robinson had 33 points to lead Fresno State (3-2), with Roberson getting 30.
It was a game of ebb and flows of these two heavyweights, LSU with the big inside game and Fresno State with the three-point shooting from all over the court.
The game opened like LSU’s first two contests with Tiger point guard Torris Bright going deep inside the lane to Stromile Swift, who scored 54 points in the first two tournament games. But unlike the first two night, Swift missed a short jumper and Melvin Ely came down on the other end and gave Fresno a 2-0 lead on a baby hook.
But the Tigers settled in early on as Brian Beshara, Jabari Smith and Swift all scored early to give LSU a 7-4 advantage with 17:24 left in the opening half. Fresno State came up with consecutive three pointers by Demetrius Porter and Terrence Robinson to take a 10-8 advantage, a lead they upped to 14-10 at the 14:30 mark.
Swift began to get it going at this point, scoring six of LSU’s next eight points. His two free throws at the 12:05 mark got LSU the 18-17 lead and started LSU on a 7-0 run which included a Bright layup and a Jabari Smith three-point play which gave LSU a 23-17 lead with 10:54 to go in the half.
Swift and Smith moved the LSU lead to 10, at 29-19, with 8:49 to go in the opening half.
The big threat against LSU turned out to be Travis Robinson of Fresno State who had 21 points in the first half and virtually kept LSU from expanding the lead even further.
Fresno State found itself in deep foul trouble in the first 20 minutes, getting whistled for 15 fouls, compared to just five for the Tigers. LSU had a run of 10 straight points it got at the free throw line as it continued to hold the Bulldogs at bay. Fresno got as close as four, 33-29, with 6:30 to go in the half.
LSU continued to get strong play from all sides and got the final four points of the half on buckets by Bright and Swift in the final minute to go to the dressing room up 49-38.
“We rebounded the ball well. This is the most physical team we have played. We certainly had to take care of the ball and we did that,” said Brady. “Jabari Smith and Stromile Swift were just too much around the goal for that team. We did the right things down the stretch. All in all, for where we are at this time of the year, to beat a good Wyoming team and then Fresno State in back-to-back consecutive games is just really tremendous for our program. This is certainly an indication that we are headed in the right direction.”
The Tigers shot 66.7 percent in the opening 20 minutes, hitting 16-of-24 shots, and 16-of-20 at the free throw line.
Robinson and Terrence Roberson got Fresno off quickly in the second half, hitting two buckets, one a trey, to quickly cut the LSU to six, 49-43.
Beshara was able to get LSU’s first points of the half on a wide-open three from the corner to put LSU up 52-43. Fresno State surged back and a three-pointer by Demetrius Porter at the 17:21 mark put LSU up just four, 52-48.
But the Tigers again were able to stem the tide and went back up 10, 58-48, on two more Smith free throws. The Bulldogs though were continuing to burn LSU from the outside with Roberson taking Robinson’s place in throwing in the three-point bombs, cutting the lead back to four, 62-58, with 13:25 to play.
The foul troubles of Fresno continued to add up as center Ely, averaging more than 20 points in the tournament, got his fifth foul with 9:24 to play when Stromile Swift scored from in close. But the long three-point shooting of the Bulldogs continued to keep them as close as three points as the game entered the final eight minutes as LSU’s field goal percentage in the second half dipped to 30 percent in the first 12 minutes of the second half.
“Those two big guys are two of the best in the country,” Fresno State Coach Jerry Tarkanian said. “We couldn’t stop them. Stromile Swift is unbelievable.”