BATON ROUGE- The LSU men’s basketball team improved to 6-0 on the year with a 71-64 victory over the defending SWAC Champions, the Alcorn State Braves, Saturday night in the Maravich Assembly Center.
LSU struggled but the win puts them at 6-0 for the first time since the 1992-93 season.
It was the first time the Tigers played Alcorn since 1980 when they defeated the Braves, 98-88, in the second round of the NCAA tournament. Coming into the game, the Tigers led the nation averaging 94.5 points a game. The Tigers didnt match this scoring mark against Alcorn St. in a game in which they struggled shooting the ball. The Braves hung in the game by hustling for loose balls and taking advantage of lucky bounces.
In the first half the Tigers looked very sloppy in both offense and defense. A well-executed score was a rare occasion for the Tigers in the first half. Just about every basket scored by the Tigers simply wasnt pretty.
Defensively the Tigers managed to allow Alcorn St. to score very similar baskets. The Tigers left men wide open under the goal and rebounded poorly. Alcorn had many second and third opportunities at shots. Foolish turnovers by the Tigers kept Alcorn in the game. All of these were things that Coach Brady feared after his team’s two-week layoff.
“I am very disappointed in our effort tonight”, said Brady. “I kept telling them we cant win on talent alone.” “We didnt play intelligent.” “I didnt get our team to concentrate and execute and that is what bothers me.”
The Tigers started off with a little flair. They controlled the opening tip and pushed the ball down the court quickly setting up an alley-oop dunk to Stromile Swift getting the Tigers on the board first. However, Alcorn St. was not intimidated. Forward Marcus Flemming responded with two dunks inside off feeds from Wallace Harris. On both occasions Flemming was left wide open under the goal.
Beshara hit a three pointer at the 17:54 mark to put the Tigers back in the lead, however LSU then missed many easy scoring opportunities by blowing lay-ups inside. The game continued to seesaw until Torris Bright scored 5 quick points with a three pointer and a jump shot from the corner. The Tigers led 18-13 with 9:56 left in the half.
Alcorn State (3-4) marched right back with points from Treymane Chambers and Terrance Cameron. Cameron cleaned up some sloppy Tiger rebounding with four points provided by his own offensive rebounds. Alcorn took a 21-19 lead with 6:59 on the clock. LSUs rebounding struggles continued as Alcorn received four straight shot opportunities by rebounding their own missed shots. LSU finally regained possession when Bright stole the ball away from Chambers.
Jermaine Williams was a bright spot for the Tigers. He came off the bench and provided 6 points. He also brought much needed composer to the court. His four points got the Tigers in the lead for good. Alcorn continued to push the Tigers with outside scores from Chambers and Harris. The Tigers eventually started using their size advantage inside and Jabari Smith scored 7 points just before half. The Tigers went into the locker room leading 35-34.
Smith led the Tigers with 9 points in the half followed by Swift who scored 8 points. Flemming led the way for Alcorn St. with 10 points.
In the second half the Tigers played much better. Although still a little rusty they did manage to pull away from Alcorn.
However, they never managed to put the Braves away. The Tigers got early second-half points by executing the offense properly. Bright, Roland, and Beshara all scored in succession following Brave missed baskets. Stromile Swift put made a statement with a power alley-oop jam from the toss of Torris Bright. With his bucket the Tigers extended their lead to 46-36.
Alcorn fought back keeping themselves in the game with a balanced offense with baskets from Cameron and Flemming. They started to find their offensive rhythm as they creeped back into the game. The Tigers began rebounding better which didnt allow the Braves second chance scoring opportunities. This was something that haunted the Tigers in the first half. LSU got a steady attack going by penetrating inside. Williams, Swift, and Smith all capitalized on this flaw in the Brave defense. Also, the Tigers were able to get the ball into the post to Swift and Smith. The two combined for 20 points in the second half.
The Tigers missed lots of foul shots late in the game. This allowed Alcorn to keep its hopes alive of a late comeback. Jabari Smith missed four late free throws and Bright missed two of which did not please Coach Brady.
“We missed too many free throws because we didnt concentrate, and thats horrible”, said Brady.
Brian Adams sparked the Braves comeback attempt with 16 second-half points including two late three pointers. However, time eventually ran out on Alcorn and the Tigers hung on for the victory. Swift led the Tigers with 19 points, followed by Smith who had 18 points. Adams and Flemming led the Braves with 16 and 14 points, respectively.
Alcorn head coach David Whitney was pleased with his teams performance. “Well, I thought we played well tonight. When you play a team of LSUs caliber you have to be mentally sharp. We were at some times tonight.”
The Tigers’ next game will be against Tennessee-Martin Dec. 14 at 7 p.m. in the PMAC.