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BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s basketball team may have been hit with a huge blow when Kisha James went down with a knee injury, while it handed Mercer an 87-31 defeat on Tuesday night in the Maravich Assembly Center.
With 16:46 remaining in the first half and LSU leading 5-4, Kisha James went down with an injury to her left knee. Although James’ reaction to the the injury made it appear to be severe, James will undergo an MRI on Wednesday to determine the extent of the injury.
In November of 1999, James was forced to miss the entire season and take a medical redshirt after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in the same knee. James had reconstructive surgery on Dec. 8, 1999, and returned in 2000-01 to average 5.8 points and 2.5 assists in 31 games as LSU’s point guard.
James started all eight games of the 2001-02 season up to this point and led the team with 6.6 assists per game, while adding 6.6 points.
In James’ place, sophomore point guard Temeka Johnson entered for only the second game of her career after missing three semesters as an academic non-qualifier. Johnson scored six points in 16 minutes before fouling out. She also had five assists and three steals.
Doneeka Hodges led six Lady Tigers in double figures with 17 points, while Ke-Ke Tardy and Aiysha Smith had 14 apiece. Scholanda Dorrell scored 12, while Patty Hanten and Roneeka Hodges scored 11 each. The Lady Tigers shot 59.3 percent from the field (35 of 59), while Mercer was only 14 of 55 for 25.5 percent.
The Lady Tigers forced 30 turnovers, but committed 21 of their own.
April Dyer led the Bears (4-4) with 14 points on 7-of-10 shooting.
After trailing for the only time in the game, 6-5, LSU took control of the game with a 25-2 run over a eight-minute span in the middle of the half to go up 30-8. In that run, reserve guard Patty Hanten scored eight point including two three-pointers.
LSU extended the lead to 41-13 on a three-pointer by Doneeka Hodges with 2:35 remaining the half, and then 46-15 on a trey by Hanten.
LSU led 48-17 at halftime.
The Lady Tigers continued to dominate the second half against the Bears, shooting better than 65 percent from the field while holding Mercer to under 20 percent.
LSU was able to turn turnovers into points, as six players got into double figures in the scoring column in the half. The Lady Tigers extended the team to 47 midway through the second half and never looked back.
The Lady Tigers return to action on Thursday at 4:30 p.m. as part of a doubleheader against Rice. The men’s team follows against Houston at 7 p.m.
Quotes from LSU head coach Sue Gunter:
“Well, I know that wasn’t very fun for you guys to watch. It wasn’t fun for me either. It was a very sloppy game and I wasn’t pleased with our intensity. It’s always hard after you come off of a very emotional game that we had on Sunday. Regardless of the outcome of the game on Sunday, we played pretty well. We just ran out of gas, but tonight it was a lack of intensity.”
“When I look at the stat sheet, I know exactly how many turnovers we had and that’s inexcusable. Those are just some things that we need to get cleaned up. That’s all there is to it. So, now we have to turn around and play Rice on Thursday, and they will be competitive. They are a good team.”
“As far as Kisha (James) is concerned, we don’t know the extent of her injury. We have an MRI scheduled tomorrow morning as early as possible. It is the knee that she hurt last season. The tendons are still very tight, but I don’t want to go into any detail, because we really don’t know that much yet. It could be anywhere from a month to a year.”
“It’s not so much for the team, but you just have to hope that it works out for her, because she has gone through a tremendous amount of turmoil. She’s such a tough competitor, and I’ll tell you this, it’ll take a lot to get her off of the floor. It was a blow to all of us to see her go down.”