LAS VEGAS — The LSU men’s basketball team will attempt to rebound from a disappointing shooting effort in its last game when it faces Arkansas-Monticello in the first of two games here in the Las Vegas Holiday Classic.
The game is the third of four Thursday at the 2,000-seat Valley High School gymnasium and is scheduled for 5 p.m. PST (7 p.m. Baton Rouge time). The game will be carried on the LSU Sports Radio Network (Eagle 98.1 FM in Baton Rouge) affiliates and in the Geaux Zone at LSUsports.net.
LSU plays Cincinnati on Friday night before returning to Baton Rouge for a Christmas practice break before getting together again to prepare for the Dec. 31 contest at Ohio State.
LSU is 6-2 following a 54-50 loss on Monday night at the Maravich Center against Northern Iowa. In that game, the Tigers shot its lowest field goal percentage of the season (41.5 percent) and were just 3-of-10 at the free throw line as the Panthers slowed the game down and packed in its defense, daring LSU to beat it from the outside.
Darrel Mitchell led LSU with 22 points, hitting three-of-four three pointers. Glen Davis was the only other Tiger in double figures with 13 points, but was limited to four rebounds.
Arkansas-Monticello lost its first two games in the classic at opponents’ sites, losing to Dayton, 63-46, and Cincinnati, 84-63. The Boll Weevils are 4-3 on the season. Arkansas-Monticello is a Division II club from the Gulf South Conference coached by Mike Newell, a former head coach at Arkansas-Little Rock, Lamar, the CBA Shreveport Storm and Southern-Shreveport.
The team arrived in Las Vegas around sunset on Tuesday and practiced for about 90 minutes at Valley High late in the day along with the other teams in this year’s Classic.
“We’ve got to execute a little bit better at times,” said LSU Coach John Brady of the improvement he hopes to see from his team in the two games. “I think defensively and our effort has been really good. We’ve got to make a few plays from time to time and the main thing is I want to see us improve our free throw shooting. If we’ve shot 70 percent from the free throw line, we’d be undefeated right now. Our team understands that.
“Our effort has been good, defense has been good. We’ve rebounded the ball well. We’ve just got to sustain it and make some plays when we have the opportunity. We played a good team that executed well against us (Northern Iowa Monday) and we need to do the same thing (Thursday) and especially against Cincinnati.”
This event has included some of the top teams in the country and last year included the NCAA runner-up team, Illinois. Last year’s event featured three NCAA Tournament teams, including both Northern Iowa and Cincinnati, who are both back this year.
Like the game Monday in Baton Rouge, the experimental rules will be in place as they are for all exempted games with the slightly extended three-point arc and lane areas and the no-charge zone under the basket.