BATON ROUGE — LSU scored a 20-point win over McNeese State Saturday night at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center, 90-70, shooting 54 percent for the game and making 21-of-31 free throws.
But the Tigers decision making continued to cause some problems in the consistency of the game for LSU, with 27 turnovers and for the first time all season, the Tigers, which entered the game with the nation’s best rebound margin of plus-28.8 was out rebounded, 44-41, by the Cowboys.
After a 10-day break, the Tigers are now 4-1 on the season as they have started a stretch of six games in four days with the next two (Tuesday at home against UNO and Saturday in Baton Rouge against Louisiana-Lafayette) smack in the middle of final exams that were pushed back a week because of Hurricane Katrina.
“The best thing about the game from my point of view is we shoot 54 percent for the game, 58 from the floor in the second half. We get to the foul line 31 times for the game, and we win by 20,” said LSU Coach John Brady. “Those are all good things to be able to do. The things that is even more impressive to me on the other end is we’re able to do all of that and win by 20, and give the ball up 27 times and get our bounded by a team that’s smaller than we are by three and give up 19 offensive rebounds.
“It shows the athleticism of our team when you can give it up 27 times on the turnover end, give up 19 offensive rebounds and win by 20. But we need to correct our decision-making. We’re a good rebounding team. What I am concerned about is our decision making with the ball. I told the team, if you give up 27 turnovers and give up 19 offensive rebounds and win by 20, you must have something going on pretty good with the rest of your play.”
Five LSU players were in double figures, topped by Glen Davis with a 21 point-10 rebound double double. Also Darnell Lazare had a career high 19 points in 23 minutes. Darrel Mitchell, despite leaving the game for eight minutes in the second half with a leg cramp, had 18 points, six assists and six steals. Tasmin Mitchell scored 13 points and Tyrus Thomas had 11 points and 10 boards.
McNeese (2-3) got 12 from Jarvis Bradley, 11 from Troy Aaron and 10 each from John Ford and Quentin Gonzales.
The Tigers appeared sluggish in the early going, but did jump quickly to a 5-0 lead. But LSU couldn’t shake McNeese for the longest time, not opening up a double digit advantage until a 26-16 score with 8:40 to go in the first half on two free throws by Lazare, who was especially aggressive on the offensive end. That 10 point advantage stayed at 39-29 with 1:05 to play, but McNeese scored five straight to make it 39-34 with 18 seconds left. The Tigers turned it over, but Lazare stole the ball back and drove in for a dunk just before the red lights came on to put LSU up, 41-34, at intermission.
LSU scored the first 10 out of the dressing room to open the second half and basically put away its 55th consecutive win against a Louisiana school that dates back to the a win over McNeese to start the streak on Dec. 8, 1988. Garrett Temple and Darrel Mitchell hit back to back threes and then Davis and Tasmin Mitchell hit shots to make it 51-34 with 16:49 to play. The lead with gradually increase to as much as 30 on three occasions before the bench was cleared and several lineup combinations were used in the final minutes.
LSU HEAD COACH JOHN BRADY
Opening Statement…
“The best thing about the game from my point of view is we shoot 54 (percent) for the game, 58 almost 57 from the floor in the second half. We get to the foul line 31 times for the game, and we win by 20. Those are all good things to be able to do. The things that’s even more impressive to me on the other end is we’re able to do all of that and win by 20, and give the ball up 23 times and get outrebounded by a team that’s smaller than we are by three and we give up 19 offensive rebounds. It shows the athleticism of our team when you can give it up 27 times on the turnover end, give up 19 offensive rebounds and win by 20. You’ve got to be doing a lot of things pretty good on this side.”
“But we need to correct our decision making. We’re a good rebounding team. We’re going to be a good rebounding team. I think we let a lot of offensive rebounds just fall out of our hands or allowed them to knock it out of our hands, whatever the case was. I’m not as concerned about that because we’ve outrebounded teams better than that. What I am concerned about is our decision making with the ball. The best team is, and I told the team, if you give up 27 turnovers and give up 19 offensive rebounds and win by 20, you must have something going on pretty good with the rest of your play.”
“But against teams as athletic as we are, the spectacular plays will diminish. So, the other things are going to win the game by making better decisions with the ball. Maybe, just maybe, we haven’t played in 10 days that had something to do with it. I don’t accept those kinds of things, and I don’t tell the team that. It wasn’t like we were limited to making some poor decisions with the ball with just one guy. It’s across the board. So, it’s something our team has got to get better at. I anticipate they will. If we can eliminate turnovers, make better decisions with the ball, and don’t be careless, that will give us more possessions where we get shots. There were 27 times we didn’t even shoot the ball. That’s incredible. That’s the difference.”
“What we did, which was good, to win by 20 and do some good things offensively and do some real good things to start the second half defensively to not allow them to score, which I thought was real positive. We came out and shut them out for about eight minutes of the second half. Still, we’ve got to make better decisions with the ball and become more efficient with the ball. If those things happen, our team will be able to really function at a high level from an offensive standpoint.”
On how he felt after being off for 10 days…
“You could see the rust out there. We had 27 turnovers and I believe we had 15 in the first half. They beat us on the boards by three tonight and you could just tell that we were rusty and that we need to get back in the groove of things. But we came out with a victory and that is all that matters. We came out with a victory that we know we didn’t play as well as we could and it just shows a lot of character in our game. We got a lot to work on if we want to be successful.”
On the impatience in the game tonight…
“I sensed the impatience. We were just too overexcited and we have to keep our composure out there and that is all just about learning the game. Today is a stepping stone for us to be a dominant team in the SEC.”
On turning this game in to a positive…
“We are a pretty good ball club. It is just constant numbers for us. We are a good athletic team and we just need to work out some of the kinks that we have. We haven’t played in nine or ten days so we were kind of rusty. We just need to get the game and the atmosphere back and hopefully we can bounce back and be the team that we can be.”
PG Darrel Mitchell
On PG Tack Minor returning soon…
“He is coming back soon and he will help us out. Any help that we can get, I am looking forward to that. He has to fit in where we need him and help us out the best that he can.”
On the experience on the team…
“Sometimes we get ahead of ourselves and turn it too fast. We made a lot of turnovers once we got the ball over half court we had the ball knocked from behind us. I think that once we get the break, unless we have a wide open man for a layup we need to just pull it up. As the season goes on the guys will get more experience and the guys will understand that more.”
MCNEESE STATE HEAD COACH TIC PRICE
“I really thought the difference in the game was points in the paint. They had 40. We had 28. We knew inside they were very physical. This may be the best LSU team I’ve coached against since we have been playing LSU. I think they have a lot of depth and are very talented. I thought Glen Davis was much improved from a year ago. You can’t go on the road and allow a team to shoot over 50 percent from the field. They made more free throws than we attempted. That is another phase that will get you beat on the road. I just think all and all, they have a fine basketball team. They are a team that can be a force to be reckoned with in the SEC.”
“We came out after halftime and allowed them to score. I thought we had really cut into their lead going into the half. Defensively, they held us in check. I think they really got their running game going. Our pressure was good initially but once they threw over the top, we didn’t have guys running back. I think that was a conditioning thing, and that is when they got their dunks and went on their run.”