BATON ROUGE – The LSU Tigers found themselves with a chance to get an important non-conference victory Tuesday night at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center, but was unable to sustain a five-point advantage in the final 8:30 of the contest, falling to Wake Forest, 77-71.
The loss came on a night when LSU posted a paid attendance figure of 12,104, the biggest pre-New Year’s Day attendance since LSU hosted UCLA on Dec. 17, 1994 (14,551). The 12,104 total was the 13th largest for the Tigers since the 2005-06 renovation of the seating capacity of the Maravich Center.
LSU (7-5) struggled with the second most turnovers of the season (17) and 2-of-14 shooting on the exterior as the Demon Deacons ran their record to 9-3 by making five three-pointers in the second half, many of them in the winning stretch of the game.
The finish, overshadowed a strong rally by LSU in the final part of the first half and the first half of the second 20 minutes.
With the game tied at 12-12 with 11:38 to go in the first half, Wake Forest would outscore LSU, 18-7, over the next seven minutes to go up 30-19 with 4:44 to play. But the LSU offense began to kick things in gear as Keith Hornsby hit a three, Josh Gray went the length of the court with a rebound off a missed three and after a WF turnover and steal by Craig Victor II, Victor was able to dunk the ball to cut the game to 30-25 in favor of Wake Forest with 3:05 to play.
That’s the margin the teams went to the dressing room with as the Demon Deacons led, 34-29.
In the opening half, LSU shot 50 percent, 11-of-22, but had 10 turnovers, while Wake Forest was 11-of-33 from the field, but had 21 rebounds and a 9-1 advantage offensively. Wake Forest had a 14-10 advantage in the paint and 9-5 off turnovers.
In the second half, Ben Simmons and Victor scored on back-to-back layups and Hornsby made two free throws to give LSU a lead at 35-34. That lead lasted just 12 seconds as Cornelius Hudson hit a three for a 37-35 advantage. But Tim Quarterman got a steal and dunk to tie the game and then after a series of possession, Hornsby would hit LSU and his second three for a 40-37 advantage with 15:57 to play. That would be LSU’s last three point make for the contest.
The teams traded ties and leads over the next five minutes, moving the game to 45-45 with 10:40 to play. Free throws by Victor and Josh Gray gave LSU the tie after being down 45-42. That started a 9-1 that saw LSU get the five-point, 51-46, advantage with 8:31 to play.
Wake Forest would tie the game at 51-51 with 7:10 to play and the game was tied for the 11th time at 58-all on the first of two free throws by Rondale Watson with 4:07 to play. He made the second for a 59-58 Demon Deacon lead. On its next possession, Josh Gray had a layup to give LSU a 60-59 advantage with 3:50 to play, the final LSU lead of the night.
Twenty-one seconds later, Dinos Mitoglou hit a three for a 62-60 advantage. About a minute later, Devin Thomas had a tip in to march the lead to 64-60. LSU’s next possession would result in two free throws for Simmons, who drew 13 fouls on the evening. But another three, this time by Bryant Crawford, pushed the Wake Forest lead to 67-62 with 2:04 to play and LSU could get no closer than four the rest of the way.
Simmons had his ninth double double of the season, scoring 21 points with 12 rebounds, but a season low of two assists. Simmons was 5-of-8 from the field and 11-of-16 from the free throw line.
Victor had 19 points and eight rebounds, with Hornsby posting 13 points.
For the game, LSU shot 47.1 percent (24-of-51) and 21-of-29 from the free throw line (72.4%).
Crawford led Wake Forest with 19 points (6-of-10 FGs, including 3 threes) with Thomas scoring 16 (6-9 FGs). Mitoglou had 13 (3-5 from the arc) and Cornelius Hudson 12. For the game Wake Forest shot 24-of-59 or 40.7 percent (13-of-26 in the second half), including 8-of-24 from the arc and exactly like LSU at the line, 21-of-29.
LSU now will regroup and begin Southeastern Conference play with two of the first three games on the road starting Saturday at 8 p.m. against Vanderbilt at Memorial Gym in Nashville. The game will be televised by ESPN2 and broadcast on the LSU Sports Radio Network (Eagle 98.1 FM in Baton Rouge).
LSU vs. Wake Forest
December 29, 2015
LSU HEAD COACH QUOTES
Head Coach Johnny Jones
Opening Statement…
“We knew we were playing a good team tonight. We knew it would take a great effort to beat this team. There in the first half, although we held them to 33 percent shooting from the field, they still had a lead at halftime. The two areas that we have been addressing and thought were of concern were second-chance opportunities—offensive rebounds and put-backs—that was the difference in the second half. In the second half, they wound up getting 14 offensive rebounds. For the game, they had 13 second-chance points. Unfortunately for us, we turned the ball over 17 times, giving them other opportunities. They turned it over 18 (times), but we only wound up with five offensive rebounds after shooting 44 percent from the field in the second half, 47 (percent) for the game. We did not give ourselves enough chances. We’d get up five points, and we did not do the little things necessary to get stops on one end of the floor and come back and execute on the offensive end of the floor. Tonight, we let a great opportunity against a very good basketball team get away from us here at home. This is a place that we must protect, and we did not do a great job of protecting our home court tonight”
On the excessive turnovers…
“We tried to make too many homerun plays instead of making good, crisp passes or passes that were going to lead to the next basket. We have to make sure that we get out of that habit in trying to make big plays. Others, we had opportunities and fumbled the ball away trying to get to the rim. We had opportunities and just did not finish. We had 17 (turnovers), but we have to do a better job as a team, making sure that we are protecting and taking care of the basketball. We need to make sure that we are getting attempts instead of turnovers. You shoot 50 percent from the field. You take those and put those, at least half of those are attempts, then we are in a much better place.”
LSU Players
Forward Ben Simmons
On team effort…
“We just played bad. We didn’t have a good game. I think we lost the game. It came down to who wanted it more. Every game is a test. We knew they were a good team coming in.”
On moving forward…
“Next game, we really have to prepare and be ready to take off.”
On low first-half shot total…
I’m a scorer, I can do a lot of things, but I didn’t even really notice I had one shot. I was just playing the game to play it—just trying to make the right play, so I wasn’t really focused on that one shot.
Guard Keith Hornsby
On Wake Forest’s performance…
“They did a good job of moving the ball around and getting good opportunities to score, but on our end we didn’t really do that. If you let another team get as many offensive rebounds down the stretch as they did, it’s hard to pull out the win.”
On team’s poor shooting night…
“I thought we did a good job of trying to attack the basket. If we didn’t do that, we wouldn’t have been in the game as much.”
Forward Craig Victor II
On team’s offensive output…
“We just have to execute on offense. Too much on the turnovers, but we just have to get back and get ready for next game. This game is behind us, so we have to go back and watch film and see where the miscommunication was, so we can get ready for the next game.”
On Wake Forest’s impact on team…
“I feel they didn’t do anything. We lost this game because we didn’t execute, we didn’t rebound. We didn’t do the small things we needed to do. They didn’t really affect our game. We were the better team, but at the same time, we have to execute on the little things. On turnovers and fast breaks too—we have to make the simple plays instead of going for the homerun plays.”
WAKE FOREST HEAD COACH DANNY MANNING
Opening Statement…
“We feel very fortunate to come away with a win. I thought we did some good things throughout the course of the ball game. We have to be a little bit more consistent, but at the end of the day, when you can get a win on the road against a Power Five conference team, you got to take it. We’re definitely going to take it and go home and try to get prepared for a tough ACC conference.”
On LSU’s struggles beyond the arc…
“We wanted to guard them. I think we can do a better job of guarding. I think at halftime they were shooting about 50% from the field, and that number is entirely too high. I thought we did a better job of being in strong defensive help and corralling the ball at times. They probably missed some shots that they normally make but so did we. That’s kind of the ebb and flow of the game.”
On Ben Simmons taking only one shot in the first half…
“How many free throws did he shoot (in the first half)? Some of the seven (attempts) were shooting attempts. We just tried to make him work. We threw a lot of different bodies at him. We had big guys and small guys on him, and we just tried to make it a night for him where he’s not very efficient. When you look at the efficiency ratings, he’s off the charts. We knew we weren’t going to stop him from scoring; we just tried to make it difficult, and we tried to slow him down a little bit.”
On how big a key rebounding was for the team…
“We’re one of the better rebounding teams in the country when you stack them up. I think we’re definitely one of the top 100 for sure. That’s just kind of our MO and who we are. We need to do a much better job of guarding the ball and not turning it over as much. We had 18 turnovers and quite a few of those came late.”
WAKE FOREST PLAYER QUOTES
Forward Devin Thomas
On how comfortable he believes his team plays on the road…
“It’s still early in the season. We don’t feel like we played that well as a team, but this was a good win for us. Coming off our loss last game against Xavier, we needed to get back on track. Now all we can do is look forward to Louisville.”
On his play in the second half…
“I think we played a better first half compared to the second. We turned the ball over a lot in the second half. Cody (Miller-McIntyre) did a good job guarding Ben Simmons. Ben was getting every call tonight, so he probably shot double-digit free throws. Any other game I don’t think we get those calls called against us, but he’s the number one pick. It’s safe to say he’ll get those calls.”
On his team’s patience in the second half…
“I was calling for the ball all second half, and I didn’t get it till late in the second half. Our team stayed patient and really tried to get the ball inside. When we were able to get it inside, we executed. We took advantage of our opportunities inside, and that is why we were victorious today.”
On what this does to the team’s confidence…
“It is always good to get a win, but we can’t get complacent. I think becoming complacent is the biggest fear on this team. We feel that we should be on a seven game winning streak instead of a one game winning streak right now. We were complacent last game against Xavier in the second half and ended up losing. We just need to make sure that we’re practicing hard. We play in the toughest conference in the country so we need to come ready to go every game.”