BATON ROUGE — Coming off the sixth largest victory in school history, the LSU women’s basketball program got the devastating news that starting point guard Kisha James will be out for the remainder of the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee as the Lady Tigers prepare to take on Rice at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
James, a junior from Pineville, was injured in the opening minutes of LSU’s 87-31 victory over Mercer on Tuesday. She underwent an MRI on Wednesday morning that confirmed the torn ACL. She will have surgery in early January. Two years ago, she used a medical redshirt year after tearing the same ACL in an exhibition game on Nov. 14, 1999.
She underwent successful surgery and returned to play last season, seeing action in all 31 games, averaging 5.8 points and 2.5 assists a game. Starting in all eight Lady Tiger games until her injury, she led the team in assists per game with 5.9, while averaging 6.5 points and 3.4 rebounds a game.
“This is a devastating blow for our team, there is no other way to look at it,” said LSU head coach Sue Gunter. “You feel for a player that has already been through this and battled back. She is such a leader on the court and we will miss her fire.
“This is also a loss for our team because we are already down with other injures and this just adds to the problem. We are very thankful to have Temeka to work into the point guard position.”
Sophomore Temeka Johnson, who only became eligible to practice and play last Saturday, will fill the point guard position with James out. In two games since gaining eligibility, she averaged six assists and four points. She will share duties with sophomore Doneeka Hodges, who is averaging a team-high 15.3 points and 4.8 assists a game.
The matchup with Rice (5-2), which is receiving votes in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches Poll, will be LSU’s third of four games in seven days before Christmas. The Owls are coming off back-to-back losses.
The Lady Tigers (5-3) are still in a very crucial time of the season. After losses to nationally ranked Purdue, Texas and a double-overtime heartbreaker to Michigan earlier in the month, LSU needs wins before traveling to Lubbock, Texas to take on nationally ranked Colorado at the end of December and opening the Southeastern Conference schedule on the road at Georgia in early January.
“This should be a very competitive game,” Gunter said. “From what we have seen of Rice on film, they are a good team that is well coached. They have good size and we expect to be tested. They have a lot of size, similar to Virginia Tech and it should be a good game.”
This will be the third meeting between the Lady Tigers and Rice, with the series tied 1-1. LSU won the initial meeting, 78-64 in 1997 in Baton Rouge and Rice won the most recent meeting 64-57 in 1998 in Houston, Texas.