BATON ROUGE — Junior college transfer Jaime Lloreda and senior forward Ronald Dupree combined for 55 points on 16 of 26 shooting to lead the LSU men’s basketball team to a 93-72 victory over McNeese State at the Maravich Assembly Center on Saturday afternoon.
The victory was the 40th in a row for the Tigers at home against in-state opponents.
Lloreda had a double double with game-highs of 23 points and 14 rebounds, while Dupree scored 22 points including eight free throws in the game. Point guard Torris Bright hit 5-of-7 shots including three three-pointers to add 16 points and dish out 12 assists. Freshman guard Darrel Mitchell contributed 12 points off the bench and senior guard Collis Temple added 10 points.
After shooting only 39 percent from the field in the first half, the Tigers shot better than 60 percent in the second to lead by as many as 26. For the game, LSU was 33 of 65 for 50.8 percent.
The Tigers (4-1) forced 24 turnovers and committed only 10 of their own. Otherwise, McNeese State shot well enought from the field — 25 of 54 for 46.3 percent — to stay close to the defensive-minded Tigers.
All 15 Tigers who dressed for the contest saw action, including redshirt freshman guard Josh Maravich, son of the late Tigers and NBA great “Pistol” Pete Maravich for whom LSU’s arena is named. Maravich played only the final minute of the game and did not record a statistic.
McNeese State (3-2), which led by as much as two in the first half, was led by guard Jason Coleman who scored 20 points. The only other Cowboy in double figures was forward Damond Williams who had 13 points.
LSU opened an 8-2 lead before McNeese responded with eight straight points to take their first lead, 10-8, in the first four-plus minutes. However, LSU answered the run with nine unanswered points of its own to lead 17-10 at the 13:45 mark.
The Tigers led by as many as eight before McNeese stormed back to lead 23-22 on a pair of free throws by Jerrick Oliver with 6:53 left in the first half. LSU went on an 18-6 run to end the half and lead 40-29 at the break.
LSU started the second half in the same fashion as it ended the first, making 13-of-20 shots and turned the ball over only twice in the first 12 minutes to extend the lead to 73-48 at the 7:45 mark.