BATON ROUGE — Senior forward Ronald Dupree hit 8-of-9 shots from the field and scored 18 points to give the LSU men’s basketball team a 32-point second-half lead over Delaware State, as the Tigers held off the Hornets down the stretch, 63-41, on Tuesday night in the Maravich Assembly Center.
LSU (3-1) shot better than 56.5 percent from the field in the first half and used runs of 11-0 and 14-2 to open a 33-16 halftime lead over the Hornets. The Tigers finished 24 of 42 shooting (57.1 percent) and made 12 of 14 free throws to rebound from a two-point loss to Texas A&M in Houston on Saturday.
Delaware State (0-4) was held to 17-of-43 shooting (39.5 percent), but made 7-of-16 three-pointers to avoid a grotesque final score. The Hornets were led in scoring by Andre Matthrews who had a game-high 20 points. Reserve Tyson Lesesne was the only other Hornet in double figures with 10.
For the Tigers, who scored 18 points off only 12 DSU turnovers, Collis Temple III continued to shoot well from the field and scored 17 points, while Antonio Hudson scored 12 and Jaime Lloreda added nine. Fourteen Tigers played in the contest.
The Hornets of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference scored the first six points of the game before Dupree scored back-to-back layups to bring the Tigers within a basket at the 15:16 mark of the first half.
After Lloreda matched a DSU alley-oop with a layup, Dupree gave LSU its first tie of the evening with an alley-oop dunk of his own from Bright with just more than 12 minutes to play. On LSU’s next possession, Dupree added his eighth point on a jumper from eight feet in the lane to tie the game once again at 10-10.
Before being relieved by Charlie Thompson, Bright hit a running jumper off the glass to give the Tigers their first lead of the game, 12-10, with 9:56 to play in the half.
Dupree continued to spark the otherwise stagnant LSU offense by grabbing an offensive rebound and laying it in for his fifth basket. As the rest of the team made only 2-of-9 shots in the first 13 mintues, Dupree made 5-of-6 to give LSU a 14-10 lead.
A three-pointer from the right wing by Temple, LSU’s first in five attempts, coupled with Dupree’s sixth bucket ended a 11-0 run and gave the Tigers a nine-point lead, 19-10.
After the Hornets matched the run with four straight points, the Tigers opened a 17-point lead by scoring the 14 of the last 16 points of the half to lead 33-16.
Hudson took only one shot in 10 first-half minutes, but opened the second half on fire, hitting four straight baskets including two three-pointers to score 10 of LSU first 14 points and give the Tigers a 47-24 lead with 14:50 to play in the game.
LSU scored the next nine points to open a 32-point lead midway through the half, as Brady replaced Dupree and Lloreda with reserves Darrel Mitchell and Brad Bridgewater.
Against mostly LSU substitutes, Delaware State slowly worked the lead to 22 by going on a 12-2 run to trail 58-36 with under five minutes to play.
Reserve guard Tony Gipson ended the run by hitting a three-pointer from the right wing.
The Tigers return to action on Saturday at 2 p.m. when they play host to McNeese State as part of a day-night doubleheader with the second-ranked LSU women’s basketball team.