Basketball is back. So is Boot Up.
With LSU just three days away from tipping off the 2019-2020 season at home against Bowling Green, head coach Will Wade joined Boot Up: The LSU Basketball Podcast to recap the Tigers’ 83-70 exhibition win over Louisiana and to preview the season ahead.
Up for discussion was the leadership of Javonte Smart and Skylar Mays, the incredible intangibles Charles Manning Jr. is bringing to the table, the development of five-star freshman Trendon Watford, and a little Joe Burrow talk.
Consistency is Key
Fresh off its first SEC regular season title since 2009 and its first Sweet 16 berth since 2006, the program is looking to establish a consistent pattern of success in Wade’s third season.
“We haven’t been to back-to-back NCAA tournaments in about 15 years,” Wade says. “So I think that’s the biggest thing for our team this season – find a way to get back to the tournament, where we can keep continually give ourselves opportunities to advance.
“Eventually, then, you’ll get to a Final Four and, eventually, if you put yourself in a position where you get to enough Final Fours, you’re going to win one.”
All Business
With the loss of Tremont Waters, Naz Reid, and Kavell Bigby-Williams to the NBA, the Tigers have taken on a new personality. The success of last season and the return of Javonte Smart and Skylar Mays in the backcourt have forged a more serious approach for the 2019-20 Tigers.
“This group, it’s a little bit more serious, which is more kind of my style,” Wade says. “Javonte has such a good way about him. He’s quiet, but he’s extremely locked. He’s extremely serious, but he can say something funny when he needs to break the mood if it gets too too dull.”
Wade says his trust level with Smart and Mays is key – not just on the floor, where they form one of the best backcourts in the SEC.
“Anytime you’ve got two guards that have been with you awhile and you have that high level of trust, I think it makes things fun.”
Dr. Manning
Wade has a future doctor on his roster in Mays, a pre-med kinesiology major, but he’s got another true student of the game in Charles Manning Jr., a junior college transfer who started in the exhibition game and scored 13 points.
He was equally impressive in his pre-game preparation and post-game analysis, when his attention to detail caught Wade’s eye.
“I was looking up at the scouting reports the other day when we were at Louisiana Tech,” Wade smiles, “and Charles Manning, he’s written, like, a dissertation on the scouting report, of notes. Everything that we had said in scout, he had taken down.”
After the game, in which Manning also contributed three assists, three rebounds, a steal and a block, all while holding Louisiana Tech point guard Daquan Bracey to just seven points and five turnovers, the junior wing was equally as thorough.
“He asked me after the game for the whole game film on his computer so he could go back and watch it himself,” Wade says. “I texted him the next day I said, ‘Well, what do you think of the game film?’ And he sent me a long list. He sounded like a coach. It’s like I watched [the film].”
Days’ Development
What do former Ole Miss sharpshooter Marshall Henderson and Tigers sophomore forward Darius Days have in common?
An ability to stick a dagger in the opposition.
Henderson did it for two seasons in Oxford, coached by current LSU assistant Bill Armstrong.
On Saturday, Armstrong saw something similar from Days, who scored 14 of his 16 points after halftime, including eight straight points that turned a two-point Tech lead into a six-point Tiger edge.
“Coach Armstrong was talking about it after the game,” Wade says. “He said, what [Days] did at the beginning of the second half is like what Marshall Henderson used to do for them at Ole Miss about once a game. Once you do that, the game’s over. It’s lights out, once you go on a 9-0 or 9-2 run where you got one guy who just fills it up with three straight threes or three or four threes.
“That’s a weapon we’re going to be able to deploy all season, which is good for us.”
Days finished last season with an offensive rating of 128.3, the best by any Tiger in two decades.
Lagniappe
- Wade said freshman forward Trendon Watford, who finished with a 10-point, 10-rebound double-double vs. Tech, “didn’t play very well.” And that’s a good sign. “He gets it from the film room onto the court, and he knows what he needs to improve on,” Wade says. “It’s always a good jumping off point when a bad game is 10 and 10. That’s always a good place to start from.”
- Wade noted LSU’s pre-SEC schedule is loaded with highly-thought-of mid-majors. The Tigers play four of the top 10 squads from College Insider’s preseason mid-major top 25 poll, including No. 9 Bowling Green, No. 3 East Tennessee State, No. 6 Liberty, and No. 10 Missouri State
- When discussing the basketball talents of LSU quarterback Joe Burrow – an all-state performer at Athens High School – Wade declined the chance to extend a walk-on invitation to Burrow when football season is done. “He’s gonna be a high NFL draft pick. He’s gonna be in New York*. I don’t think he’s gonna have any time for us.”
*Technically, the 2020 Draft is in Vegas. We’ll forgive the error.