BATON ROUGE — Final exams are around the corner for the LSU men’s basketball team. Sunday night, they completed the first set of basketball tests completing the LSU Invitational undefeated with a 92-57 win over Troy at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
The Tigers ran their record to 5-0, 4-0 in the Invitational and the only undefeated team in the two-weekend round-robin event. Troy is now 3-4 and 2-2 in the Invitational, tied for second with Centenary and Northwestern State. Those two teams finished up their play on Saturday.
LSU now takes a step forward for another test in the final game before the school mandated break for concentrated study period and final exams as they host Cal State Fullerton Tuesday at 7 p.m. in the Maravich Center. The game will be televised on FSN and tickets are available online at LSUsports.net and at the LSU Athletics Ticket Office.
The Tigers faced a challenge from a team that Saturday night in a 100-63 win over Northwestern State hit six-of-their-first-nine three point field goals and made 14 for the game. But this time, the Tigers were the team starting strong as the clamps they put on the Troy offense led to LSU’s strong offense on the other end.
Marcus Thornton started what would be a big night for him by hitting a three off the opening tip and then Tasmin Mitchell hit a baseline jumper to push the margin to 5-0. Thornton hit another three-pointer and capped the run with a monstrous offensive rebound dunk to make it 10-0 2:30 into the game.
Travis Lee finally hit a jumper at the 16:37 mark to get Troy on the board but Garrett Temple and Bo Spencer each hit treys to make it 16-4 at the first media timeout as it was LSU hit, hitting 6-of-10 shots and 4-of-7 from the arc.
LSU would go on to a 41-27 halftime advantage and held off any Troy run to start the second half eventually pushing the lead to 20 at 58-38 with 12:12 to go and stretching the margin to as much as 38 in the final seconds.
Thornton would top the 30-point mark for the fourth time in his career and the 19th time he was over 20 points in a contest with 32, hitting 13-of-24 shots, including 4-of-10 treys. He also had eight rebounds and three assists. Chris Johnson had 12 points, nine boards and five blocked shots while Garrett Temple became the first player to have 10 assists since Tack Minor had 10 versus Ohio State on Jan. 15, 2005. Temple also had nine points and seven boards.
Bo Spencer had 13 points and six assists to round out the LSU high totals.
Brandon Hazzard was the only player in double figures with 16 points for Troy.
The Tigers shot 48.6 percent from the field (34-of-70) and 37.5 percent from the arc (9-of-24), while Troy hit just 34.4 percent overall (21-of-61) and 8-of-24 from the arc. LSU had a big advantage on the boards, out rebounding the Trojans 52-30.
“It was a good win with 26 assists and 8 turnovers,” said LSU Coach Trent Johnson. “I mentioned to them prior to going out that Troy State has improved as much in a week and half as any team I’d seen in a while. We had a lot of respect for this team. Don (Maestri) is heck of coach. I’m a basketball junkie and it speaks volumes for what he has been able to do at Troy over the years. I thought we did a very good job defensively of staying disciplined. What they tried to run offensively, penetrate and kick back for the three point shooters, but for the most part we stayed home. We got good contributions from everybody. All that being said, we are moving up in class again. Cal State Fullerton is an NCAA Tournament team with four starters back, one young man I am very familiar with, Josh (Akognon, Cal State Fullerton senior star player).This will be interesting come Tuesday. ”
JOHNSON SHOW DEBUTS MONDAY
Coach Trent Johnson‘s radio show debuts Monday night from Walk-Ons in Baton Rouge and the show will air on many of the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network (New Country 100.7 FM The Tiger in Baton Rouge) beginning at 7 p.m.
POSTGAME QUOTES
LSU HEAD COACH TRENT JOHNSON QUOTES
Opening statement …
“It was a good win with 26 assists and 8 turnovers. I mentioned to them prior to going out that Troy State has improved as much in a week and half as any team I’d seen in a while. We had a lot of respect for this team. Don (Maestri) is heck of coach. I’m a basketball junkie and it speaks volumes for what he has been able to do at Troy over the years. I thought we did a very good job defensively of staying disciplined. What they tried to run offensively, penetrate and kick back the three point shooters, but for the most part we stayed home. We got good contributions from everybody. All that being said, we are moving up in class again. Cal State Fullerton is a NCAA Tournament team with four starters back, one young man I am very familiar with, Josh (Akognon).This will be interesting come Tuesday. ”
On preparing for Cal State Fullerton …
“For me it is all about not letting the offense dictate how well you play. For us to be successful, we have to defend and we have to defend at a high caliber. Marcus is doing a good job right now. Again, we have to put this behind us because of the caliber of perimeter players we will see Tuesday (against Cal State Fullerton ) are a level and tournament tested team, a very good basketball team, a well-coached team and a team with a lot of toughness and quickness.”
On Marcus Thornton …
“He played well. He had some nice passes. For the most part, I thought everyone played well. Garrett Temple almost had a triple double, but he and Bo (Spencer) had a combination of 16 assists. You have to give his teammates a lot of credit in terms of getting the ball to him. I thought Marcus took good shots. Marcus is one of those guys who can take bad shots and make them, but he took good shots within the framework of what we are trying to do.”
On offensive rebounds …
“Chris (Johnson) is doing a good job and it was an improvement as we all know given our share of offensive rebounds in the first three or four games. It’s a plus.”
On what makes Cal State a good opponent …
“They have good players, for one. They have a heck of a basketball coach and there is a level of toughness to them that you appreciate. They are not going to beat themselves. We are going to have to play well, take care of the ball and really get the shooters. They run a combination of what Troy offensively does, what Memphis does, to penetrate and draw back three- point shooters and they can also play on the half court. It is the right time in terms of our progression. Our schedule has worked out for the most part.”
LSU PLAYER QUOTES
Forward Garrett Temple
Opening statement…
“We only beat a team by six points in our last game and didn’t shoot the ball well. We came out in this game against a very good three-point shooting team, and we had to buckle down on defense. Marcus Thornton came out and knocked some shots down. Bo (Spencer) did as well. I knocked a couple down, and we played a great all-around game.”
On LSU’s defensive effort…
“Defensively, like I said, we wanted to come out. They (the coaches) put in our heads that they scored 100 points last night. We got a text message and a call. We knew that this team could shoot the ball. They average 30 three-point attempts per game, and they made 15 last night, so that was something big that we wanted to keep them from. Our perimeter players did a great job of guarding the ball and not letting them get open threes up.”
Point guard Bo Spencer
Opening statement…
“We came out here with good defensive pressure and played hard. Coach told us to stick to the game plan, not give up on defense and not let up at all. We wanted to come out and just play hard, solid defense. If we get tired, rest on offense but come out and play hard on defense.”
Guard Marcus Thornton
Opening statement…
“I think we came out with good defensive pressure. In the second half, we didn’t do what we wanted to do, but we came back with 10 minutes left, turned it up and won the game.”
On if he’s getting more comfortable in Coach Johnson’s offense…
“Yes. I’m becoming accustomed to his system. It took me awhile, but I think everybody is doing a good job and playing their roles, and we’re winning games.”
TROY HEAD COACH DON MAESTRI
On what caused the team to fall behind …
“First of all LSU is a great team. They got a big lead right off the bat. I felt like we were playing come from behind before the game even started. That was my fault. I shouldn’t have spread the ball that early.”
On LSU’s ability to rebound and defend the ball …
“You can always tell a good coach by how well the players carry out exactly what the coach emphasizes. He is a great defensive coach. I said before the game that LSU has a legitimate chance at winning the SEC Western Division title because they guard so well. He does not ever let them stop playing. They are fundamentally sound on defense and offense. They go after every ball and they even fast break. He also has a lot of talent and experience on that team, but the defense is going to keep him in every ball game in the SEC. I predict they will win the SEC Western Title.
On the defensive pressure from LSU and low number of turnovers …
“One of the reasons we shot as poorly as we did is because we could not execute tonight. We could not get into a rhythm. We needed to be in some sort of rhythm to be able to hit the wide open shots that presented themselves. We also made bad decisions in the first half on when to shoot. We had an ample opportunity to get the ball to a guy who was wide open, but we decided to take the ball one-on-one. We played a very good basketball team and our kids might have played a little tight. I introduced the tightness to the team today. We did not get to practice it, because we played a game last night. But again, LSU has a very solid basketball team. They will probably go 13-0 before hitting the regular season.”