BATON ROUGE – The LSU men’s basketball team faces its second-straight division leader in the Florida Gators, leaders of the East, in a rare SEC Sunday noon men’s basketball game at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
The contest will be televised nationally by ESPN and broadcast on the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network (WTGE New Country 100.7 FM The Tiger in Baton Rouge) and at LSUsports.net/live.
The popular magic act “Quick Change” returns for halftime activities. Tickets are available online at LSUtix.net for $15 for adults and $5 for youth ages 3-12. LSU students are admitted free of charge with an LSU ID and the student lounge will open at 10:30 a.m. sponsored by Acme Oyster House. Tickets on game day will be available beginning at 10:30 a.m. at the upper concourse ticket windows of the Maravich Center.
Florida comes in with a 20-5 record, 9-2 in the East and ranked 14th in the AP poll and 15th in the Coaches poll. LSU is trying to break a nine-game conference losing streak at 10-16 and 2-9 in the SEC. The Tigers played a game they had a chance to compete in for the fourth time in the last five games but couldn’t score in the final minutes and gave up 30 points off 17 turnovers in a 67-56 loss to Western Division leader Alabama on Thursday.
“As it relates to us, there were some improvements (Thursday) that we got to the same position in the game with four or five minutes to go and we didn’t make a play,” said LSU Coach Trent Johnson. “We were in position to make plays and we didn’t make plays. I thought we played a good basketball game for 32-35 minutes, then the best team made plays and we didn’t.”
Four of Florida’s expected starters average in double figures with Erving Walker averaging 14.7 points a game, Kenny Boynton 12.9, Vernon Macklin 11.3 and Chandler Parsons 10.8. Alex Tyus (8.7 ppg) rounds out the starters for the Gators who have had a week off since a 61-60 win over Tennessee last weekend in Gainesville.
“For me there were two teams in my own little closet that I thought would be at the forefront of this league,” said Johnson. “In the West it was probably the team we played (Thursday), and then Florida. They’ve got a mix of seniors, juniors and freshmen. When you look at what Billy (Donovan) has done there, so much has been brought up about one-and-dones and two-and-pros, one of the reasons they’ve been so consistent as a program is their blend of seniors, juniors and sophomores. A guy graduates and the next guy steps in and they don’t have big drops in their program.
“Chandler Parson seems like he’s been there forever. My first year when he came to our place I thought how are you going to guard him? He’s big, he shoots it, he runs and he moves. Walker is as quick as all get out. Then what they have going on in the post with Tyus and Macklin, they’re special. They’re really solid, they guard you and they can play fast or play slow. I think this is a basketball team without question that’s going to go deep in the tournament. I really believe that.”
Parsons suffered a deep thigh bruise in the win over Tennessee and the Gainesville Sun blog of Coach Donovan’s media session seems to indicate that Parson is doubtful to start against the Tigers but could come off the bench against LSU.
Expect LSU to go with its lineup of the last three games with the freshman guard trio of Andre Stringer, Matt Derenbecker and Ralston Turner with juniors Malcolm White and Storm Warren at the forward positions. White had his best SEC game of 14 points against Alabama despite a couple of severe cases of leg cramps which is he said in the post-game was the first time he had suffered a case that bad in a game. He is listed as probable for the Florida game.
“Malcolm has been working extremely hard,” said Coach Johnson. “I just wish he wouldn’t have gotten cramps. From a pure explosive and rebound standpoint, Malcolm matches up with a lot of people in our league. It’s just a matter of knocking down open shots, understanding your second and third options, and understanding what we want to do offensively. He’s played well the last four or five games in terms of overall intensity, rebounding and staying out of foul trouble.”
The Tigers will next travel to Starkville to take on Mississippi State on Wednesday at 8 p.m. before returning to Baton Rouge to face Vanderbilt on Saturday at 12:47 p.m.