BATON ROUGE — The LSU men’s basketball team tries to win a third straight game for the first time in the 2007-08 season as the Tigers host a rare Sunday afternoon game at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center against the University of Georgia.
Tipoff time is set for 1 p.m. and the game will be regionally-televised by Raycom Sports. The radio broadcasts will be available on the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network, in the “Geaux Zone” of LSUsports.net and on the SEC channels of XM Satellite Radio.
Tickets for the game are available online at LSUsports.net and will be available beginning at the Maravich Center upper concourse ticket windows beginning 90 minutes prior to tipoff. Tickets are $14 for adults and $5 for youth (ages 3-12).
There is a special $5 ticket available for registered organ donors as part of the Louisiana Organ Procurement Association’s organ awareness day at the Maravich Center.
LSU won its second straight game for the third time this season Wednesday night with a strong finish in a 62-55 win over South Carolina in Columbia. It was LSU’s third SEC road win of the season and came on the heels of a win in the prior game, 69-49, over Ole Miss that was the first SEC home win of the year.
LSU twice won back-to-back games in November but was unable to get the third straight, but this would be the perfect opportunity for the Tigers to win a third straight as LSU (11-16, 4-9) is now in a four-way tie for third in the Western Division opening league play on Saturday. At least one team, either Alabama or Ole Miss, will have five wins in the league because the two teams play each other.
Georgia enters the game 12-14 overall and 3-10 in the SEC Eastern Division under head coach Dennis Felton who is in his fifth year in Athens. Last year in a Sunday game in Athens, Levi Stukes hit a three-pointer with less than a second remaining to give Georgia a 57-54 win over then 21st-ranked LSU.
LSU has been powered lately by the play of its two big men inside ? Chris Johnson and Anthony Randolph. The pair has both posted double double in both of the latest SEC wins and Johnson has blocked 11 shots in the last two games, including a career matching six at South Carolina.
We had a very successful game at South Carolina. I thought we played well on the road. Georgia has been playing up and down, but (Georgia head coach) Dennis Felton will have his team ready to play. We have to do a good job on guarding Sundiata Gaines, and the size that they have inside may present some problems for us. Right now, we are preparing for Georgia and the hard-fought battle on Sunday.”
“We had a very success game at South Carolina,” said LSU interim head coach Butch Pierre, now 3-3 in his first six games after taking over the head coaching position. “I thought we played well on the road. Georgia has been playing up and down, but (Georgia head coach) Dennis Felton will have his team ready to play. We have to do a good job on guarding Sundiata Gaines (the team’s leading scorer at 15.1 ppg), and the size that they have inside may present some problems for us. We are looking forward to playing Georgia and a hard-fought battle on Sunday and hope our fans will come out and support this team.”
LSU will close out its home schedule on Wednesday night at 7 p.m. against Alabama in a game televised by CST and then closes out the regular season at Mississippi State on Saturday, March 8 in a game that Raycom Sports has selected as one of its closing weekend regional telecasts.