BATON ROUGE, La. — LSU’s women’s basketball team, coming off the most successful season in school history, has been tabbed as the fifth-best team in the nation for the upcoming 2003-04 season by WOMENSCOLLEGEHOOPS.com “Very Early Bird” rankings.
The Lady Tigers finished last year ranked No. 3 in the Associated Press poll and No. 5 in the coaches poll and return three starters and nine letter winners from the team last won 30 games, the Southeastern Conference Tournament title and advanced to the NCAA Elite Eight.
Defending national champion UConn is the top ranked team by the website devoted entirely to women’s basketball. Duke, Tennessee and Kansas State are also ranked ahead of the Lady Tigers.
The rest of the top 10 includes Texas, Purdue, Stanford, Utah and Texas Tech. Fellow SEC schools Georgia (12th), Vanderbilt (22nd), Arkansas (27th), Miss State (41st) and South Carolina (46th) are also ranked in the top 50.
LSU is scheduled to take to the floor for its first game in mid November with returning All-Americans Seimone Augustus and Temeka Johnson. Both are currently competing with the United States Young Women National Team for the 2003 FIBA World Championships.
Season tickets for the Lady Tigers are available now as part of the “Hot Summer Ticket Month.” Contact the LSU ticket office at (225) 578-2184 or go online to www.LSUSports.net.