CHARLESTON, S.C. – The LSU men’s basketball team looks to improve on the deficiencies that hurt them Tuesday night at Coastal Carolina when they begin play Thursday in the first round of the Charleston Classic at the TD Arena.
LSU (1-1) will meet Northwestern (1-0) of the Big 10 in the second game of the four-game first day of the event hosted by ESPN and the Southern Conference. The game is set to tip at approximately 2 p.m. CST and will be televised by ESPNU (Justin Kutcher and Jay Williams), while the radio broadcast will be available on the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network (Kevin Ford and Ricky Blanton on New Country 100.7 FM The Tiger in Baton Rouge). The broadcast can also be heard in the Geaux Zone at www.LSUsports.net/live.
The other first-round matchup on LSU’s side of the bracket is Tulsa against Western Kentucky (11:30 a.m., ESPN3). The bottom half of the bracket find VCU meeting Seton Hall at 4 p.m. (ESPNU), with Georgia Tech taking on Saint Joseph’s in the nightcap (7 p.m. CST, ESPN3).
LSU will play either Tulsa or Western Kentucky in the second day of tournament action at either Noon or 2:30 p.m. on Friday. The tournament will take Saturday off and then conclude with four more games on Sunday.
The focus was all about the Tigers at two separate practice sessions on Wednesday as the team worked for an hour at TD Arena before moving to nearby The Citadel for another hour of practice and walkthrough. This after a 71-63 setback at Coastal Carolina when the Chanticleers came up with a 25-6 rally from a nine-point LSU lead to a 34-24 halftime deficit for LSU.
In the end, the Tigers were outrebounded 19 (53-34) and 19-11 on the offensive boards which led to a 19-12 second chance points advantage for CC.
“Going into Thursday,” said LSU Coach Johnson at practice Wednesday, “the number one priority is to block out, to put a body on someone and rebound. Everybody has a responsibility; everyone has a role from a defensive standpoint and that’s always to play with a level of intensity. So that was what was very surprising in terms of what happened (Tuesday) night vs. Coastal Carolina. That’s the number one thing.
Then we are going to have to sustain a level of defensive intensity, but also stay disciplined because Northwestern is a very experienced basketball team. Having face two of (NU Coach) Bill Carmody’s teams in the past at Stanford when were successful in beating them, they really test your defensive principles. We had a lot of plays (Tuesday) where we had guys get frustrated and started to gamble, not stay solid and sound on defense and that hurt us.”
Northwestern was a 60-36 winner in their opener on Sunday night against Texas-Pan American to open Carmody’s 12th season at the Evanston, Ill., school. The Wildcats limited the Broncs to 29.8 percent shooting from the field while forcing 16 turnovers in the contest. John Shurna led Northwestern with 15 points, while Luka Mirkovic and Drew Crawford were also in double figures with 12 and 11. The Wildcats have nine members of their roster that are juniors and seniors.
“They are very experienced,” said Johnson. “and they pass and catch very well … They have post guys who handle it on the perimeter with passing and catching and getting you to over extend and gamble and then they’ll back cut you. Usually the team that have success against this type of offense are those teams that are really sound defensively.”
LSU is expected to continue with the lineup it has started in the first two games with freshman Anthony Hickey at the point guard position, with sophomores Andre Stringer and Ralston Turner at the other two guard spots. Storm Warren will take the forward spot and Justin Hamilton will start at center.
Warren had his seventh straight double figure scoring game dating back to last year with 14 points, just missing a double double with nine rebounds, while Turner had 12 second-half points in scoring a team high 15 points. Hamilton and Johnny O’Bryant III off the bench each had nine points.
“Again for us it is about understanding,” said Johnson. “We just came off a game where we broke down completely from a defensive standpoint rebounding the ball. We got out rebounded 19 and we forced them to make 18 turnovers and still had an opportunity to win the game. It’s early so we’ve got to see how we are going to respond in coming back out and competing at a high level. We didn’t make some shots and that really hurt us and then we forgot you’ve got to go to the other end and defend. So the bottom line is we’ve just have to do what we’ve been practicing, do what we’ve been taught and that is to play good solid sound basketball and defensively everybody do their job and we should be okay.”
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