The LSU men’s basketball team earned its first bid to the NCAA Tournament since 2000, it was announced on Sunday by the NCAA Committee. The No. 8-seeded Tigers will face No. 9-seeded Purdue in the first round of the South Region at approximately 2 p.m. on Friday in Birmingham, Ala.
Tickets to the six-game regional held in Birmingham, Ala., cost $120 each. Tickets can be purchased by calling 1-800-590-6908 or by going online to www.southtix.com. The event will be played in the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center.
Should the Tigers (21-10, 8-8 SEC) get past the Boilermakers (18-10, 10-6 BigTen) in the first round, they would face either No. 1 seed Texas or the winner of the Tuesday play-in game between North Carolina-Ashville and Texas Southern, the No. 16 seed in the South Region. The Sweet 16 in the South Region will be held in San Antonio, Texas.
The LSU and Purdue men’s teams have only met one time on the hardwood, and it too was in the NCAA Tournament. On March 13, 1986, in the Baton Rouge sub regional, the 11th-seeded Tigers defeated the sixth-seeded Boilermakers, 94-87, in double overtime on their way to becoming the lowest seed to ever advance to the Final Four.
This season, LSU has won seven of its past eight games, including a 2-1 record in this past weekend’s Southeastern Conference Tournament where they beat Arkansas and No. 7 Florida before falling to No. 25 Mississippi State on Saturday. The Tigers have beaten three top-10 teams this season, only the second time in school history the Tigers have beaten three top-10 teams in a season and have a 21-10 record entering the tournament.