FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – LSU tries to put an end to its Southeastern Conference losing streak against the team it last beat in the league, the Arkansas Razorbacks, here Saturday afternoon at Bud Walton Arena.
Tipoff is set for 12:47 p.m. as the first game of the Saturday SEC doubleheader on the SEC Network. Stations carrying the game in Louisiana are: Alexandria – KLAX; Baton Rouge – WAFB; Lafayette – KADN; Lake Charles – KVHP; New Orleans – WUPL; Shreveport – KMSS.
The game will also be available on the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network (WTGE New Country The Tiger in Baton Rouge).
The two teams both struggled to get to Fayetteville after games in Mississippi on Wednesday – LSU at Oxford to play Ole Miss and Arkansas at Starkville to face Mississippi State – and LSU elected to come to Fayetteville on Thursday afternoon from Oxford, ironically arriving about 30 minutes prior to Arkansas arriving from Starkville. Much of the city, including the campus, has been closed after receiving some 20 inches of snow on Tuesday and Wednesday, but the game will be played as scheduled as temperatures rose above freezing on Friday allowing any of the roads to clear. Campus officials were busy Friday morning bulldozing the parking lots around Bud Walton Arena to allow fans to park around the arena.
The team has been using the time for study session for school and video sessions before practicing Friday morning at Bud Walton Arena.
LSU is trying to break a seven-game losing streak in the league, now at 10-14 overall and 2-7 in the SEC West. But LSU is coming off another improved performance in a 66-60 loss at Ole Miss, a game in which LSU was able to stay in the lead or tied with Ole Miss until the final 3:03 of the game. But the Arkansas team that LSU faces, at 14-9 and 4-6, is better than the one that lost at LSU in early January.
“Arkansas is a much different basketball team from the last time we played them,” said LSU Coach Trent Johnson after taking his team through a 100-minute practice. “I think we are a lot different too. Storm (Warren) is back a couple of games, couple of good practices under his belt; Matt (Derenbecker) and Ralston (Turner) are back and so both teams are different. They are coming off three straight losses and we are coming off our share of losses but we are playing better. Hopefully we will come out at a high level and continue to improve. We had our opportunities versus Ole Miss and we had some shots that didn’t go down. You have to tip your hat to Ole Miss. Chris Warren made some plays. We didn’t play well here last year. It was a very noncompetitive game on our part. This is an Arkansas team that is better at home than on the road.”
Arkansas had just one player in double figures in a 67-56 loss at Mississippi State Wednesday as Marcus Britt scored 10 points. State held Rotnei Clarke to just nine points and Marshawn Powel to four. LSU in its loss did get double figure games out of two of the players who had missed games – Turner (16) and Warren (10) and its high scorer was the player (Derenbecker, 19) who had limited time in the game prior to Ole Miss (at home versus Mississippi State) because of a sprained ankle.
“I don’t think people really understand that we’ve been playing the majority of league play without two of our best players in Ralston and Storm and Matt’s ankle and Garrett Green‘s back and that’s so much a part of it when you are an inexperienced team. These last three games have been an indication of what this basketball team would be like during league,” Johnson said. “It’s good to have them at full speed and see what we can do from here in terms of playing good basketball.”
The Tigers will probably go with the same lineup that started at Ole Miss with the freshman backcourt of leading scorer Andre Stringer (12.3 points per game), Turner (12.0 ppg) and Derenbecker (6.7 ppg and 10.0 in league games) with juniors Warren (6.2 ppg) and Malcolm White (8.2 ppg) at the forward spots.
Clark leads Arkansas in scoring at 13.0 points per game, while Powell comes in at 10.6 a game, but at a team best 13.5 points per game in league play.
In the first meeting between the two teams at the Maravich Center one month ago, LSU was a 56-53 winner as LSU held Arkansas to just 18 percent shooting and 1-of-9 from the arc in the first 20 minutes in building a 31-17 halftime advantage that allowed LSU to hold the lead in the second half. White led LSU with 13 points, while Derenbecker added 12 and Stringer 11 points and seven assists. Marshawn Powell led Arkansas with 15 points, while Delvon Johnson had 10.
LSU returns home to play two games at home next week, starting on Thursday night at 8 p.m. against Alabama in the first of two consecutive games on ESPN. Tickets for the contest are available at www.LSUtix.net.
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