LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — LSU’s sixth-ranked Lady Tigers basketball team enters the Southeastern Conference Tournament as the No. 2 seed and will play No. 7 seed Arkansas on Friday at 2:30 p.m. in the second round in ALLTEL Arena.
Homestanding Arkansas (21-9), which split its regular-season contests with the Lady Tigers, came from behind to beat No. 10 seed Alabama, 53-48, in the tournment’s second game of the first round. Shameka Christon scored 20 points on 9-of-15 shooting and added six rebounds to pace the Lady’Backs. Dana Cherry was the only other Lady’Back in double figures with 10 points on 4-of-12 shooting.
Arkansas handed LSU its only loss in its first 25 games, 82-72, on Jan. 19 in Fayetteville, Ark., when Christon scored 25 points on 10-of-13 from the field. India Lewis chipped in 19 points, while Cherry and Rudy Vaden each added 13, to hand the second-ranked Lady Tigers their first loss after starting the season 15-0.
However, LSU avenged this loss on Feb. 27 in Baton Rouge, as the Lady Tigers built a 23-point lead with 6:23 to play before winning 70-57. Seimone Augustus, the SEC Freshman of the Year, led LSU with 17 points, while Ke-Ke Tardy had 15 and Temeka Johnson had 10.
The third meeting between LSU and Arkansas will come on a neutral court, although a SEC Tournament first-day record crowd of 8,513 should return to watch their in-state Lady’Backs.
The Lady Tigers (24-3, 11-3 SEC) finished second in the league behind undefeated Tennessee, equaling the best conference record in school history. LSU’s 24 regular season wins are also the most under head coach Sue Gunter and the most overall since the 1977-78 season.
This is just the second time LSU enters the SEC Tournament as the No. 2 seed, having also done so in 1999. The Lady Tigers fell to Kentucky in the second round that year in Chattanooga, Tenn.
LSU is looking for its second tournament title and first since 1991. The Lady Tigers made it to last year’s championship game as the No. 4 seed by defeating Kentucky and top seeded Tennessee before falling to Vanderbilt in the title game.
SEC Freshman of the Year and second-team All-SEC selection Seimone Augustus leads the Lady Tigers into the tournament. The Baton Rouge native is averaging 15.0 points and 5.4 rebounds per game, while honorable mention All-SEC selection Aiysha Smith is not far behind with 12.6 points and 5.8 rebounds per contest. Junior guard Temeka Johnson, who is averaging 9.4 points and 5.8 assists per game, joined Smith as honorable mention All-SEC.
Each game of the tournament, which began on Thursday with the four first round games, will be broadcast live on SEC-TV (Fox Sports Net, ch. 37 locally). The second round games will be at noon, 2:30, 6 and 8:30 p.m. on Friday. Tennessee, LSU, Georgia and Mississippi State are the top four teams that received a first-round bye.
The semifinals are on Saturday at 6 and 8:30 p.m. with the championship game on Sunday at 3 p.m. live on ESPN2.