BATON ROUGE – After posting a 10-4 non-conference record, the LSU men’s basketball team now faces its 16-game Southeastern Conference slate beginning Saturday afternoon at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center against Ole Miss.
Game time is 12:45 p.m. and will be televised regionally by the SEC Network (WAFB in Baton Rouge). The game will also be broadcast by the affiliates of the LSU Sports Radio Network (New Country 100.7 FM in Baton Rouge) and in the Geaux Zone at www.LSUsports.net/live.
Tickets are available at www.LSUtix.net and beginning at 11 a.m. at the upper concourse ticket windows of the Maravich Center. Tickets start at $15 for adults and $5 for youth (ages 3-12).
The first 3,000 fans will receive the second in the set of LSU Legends bobble heads – LSU all-time leading rebounder, Rudy Macklin. Also the LSU cheerleaders and Tiger Girls will debut their routines they will use in the upcoming national championships.
Both teams are 10-4 on the season and both teams will be down players for the league opener. LSU’s Johnny O’Bryant III is out indefinitely after he broke the fourth metacarpal on his left hand on Wednesday hitting the rim while going for a rebound in a 5-on-0 drill and had surgery on Thursday night. Malcolm White will miss the game attending a memorial service and funeral after the death of a family member this week.
Ironically, both players have Mississippi ties with O’Bryant a Mississippi native (Cleveland, Miss.) and White, a two-year player for the Rebels before transferring to LSU.
Ole Miss also announced on Thursday that it has removed three players from its roster for violation of team rules.
With O’Bryant out, who has started the last eight games, the starting spot returns to senior forward Storm Warren. Warren started the first six games of the season and has been a valuable part of the LSU team both offensive and defensively when in the game. He made two free throws with 1.2 seconds left to beat Houston and led the team in scoring with 15 points at North Texas. He is averaging 8.0 points per game and 4.9 rebounds and against Grambling on Dec. 29 became the school’s 37th player to pull down 500 career rebounds.
Freshman Anthony Hickey (8.8 ppg, 3.9 apg, 2.5 spg) will again start at point guard. Hickey is in the top six in the league in assists and on top of the league in steals per game, while Andre Stringer will be in the lineup for his second straight game after missing five December games because of a fainting incident in a practice prior to the Dec. 10 Boise State game. Stringer had eight points in 24 minutes in his return and is averaging 11.7 points per game.
Sophomore Ralston Turner (9.9 ppg) starts at the third guard with Justin Hamilton at center. The junior transfer from Iowa State scored a career high 21 against Virginia Monday night and averaged 12.3 points, 6.9 rebounds and 1.5 blocks.
While LSU’s seven-game win streak came to an end in the narrow 57-52 loss at UVA on Monday, Ole Miss stopped a three-game losing streak with a 50-48 win over SMU on Tuesday. Senior Terrance Henry of Monroe averages 11.6 points per game and Jarvis Summers comes in with a 10.4 points per game average for Ole Miss.
Even without O’Bryant and White, LSU Coach Trent Johnson expects his Tigers to respond, having done so when Stringer was out.
“We have to continue to do what we do best, defend and rebound,” he said Thursday in the local media session. “Our rebounding will be really tested because that is what Ole Miss is strong at. We have to play to our strength versus certain teams in certain games. I fully expect these guys to respond, and I shouldn’t have any reason not too because they have done it when we lost Andre (Stringer).”
After the Saturday opener, the Tigers will play four of their next five games on the road with just a Jan. 17 game with Auburn in the Maravich Center.
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