BATON ROUGE – No. 9 LSU will close out the regular season on Sunday against Kentucky in the PMAC at 1 p.m. CT on the SEC Network for Senior Day honoring Angel Reese and Hailey Van Lith.
There will be a halftime ceremony for Reese and Van Lith. Both players have the option to return next season or enter the WNBA draft, but they have both stated they do not intend to make an official decision until the season wraps up. Sunday will also be Kim Mulkey bobblehead day and will be handed out before the game at each gate.
Eric Frede and Christy Thomaskutty will call the action on the SEC Network. Fans can listen to Patrick Wright and Shaeeta Williams on the LSU Sports Radio Network, 107.3 FM in Baton Rouge.
With its win at Georgia on Thursday LSU locked up the No. 2 seed in the SEC Tournament which means it will play in Greenville, South Carolina next Friday at 5 p.m. CT. A win against the Wildcats on Sunday or an Ole Miss would allow LSU to finish in sole possession of second place in the SEC. With a loss and an Ole Miss win, LSU would still finish second in the league tied with Ole Miss and with the win in Oxford earlier in the year the Tigers would own the tiebreaker over the Rebels.
Reese has set records and helped elevate the LSU program to historic heights in her two seasons in Baton Rouge. She set a NCAA record with 34 double-doubles last season and led LSU to its first ever National Championship. She led the SEC last season in scoring and rebounding and is in good position to do the same this year which would make her the first player since Vanderbilt’s Wendy Scholtens in 1989 and 1990 to lead both stats in two straight years.
Van Lith came to LSU wanting to learn the point guard position under Coach Mulkey. A natural two-guard, Van Lith has slowly improved at the point position and is playing her best basketball now that the season is in its home stretch. She had a season-high 26 points at Tennessee and then led LSU with 18 points at Georgia, sinking four threes in both games and combining for 6 assists to just one turnover in both matchups.
February was a good month for the Tigers who won all seven games in the month. That comes, in large part, thanks to improved defense for the Tigers. LSU has had a high octane offensive attack all year, but in February the Tigers began to clock defensively too. They reached their defensive goals of holding opponents below 68 point and below 39.9 percent shooting in all seven games in February. Reese averaged 17.4 points, 15.0 rebounds and 3.1 assists in February and Hailey Van Lith has picked up her play as well, leading the Tigers in scoring in both of the past two games.
Aneesah Morrow and Reese have been a dominant post duo for the Tigers. They are both finalists for the Naismith Award and average a double-double. Reese had 19 double-doubles while Morrow has 17 this year. There have been 10 games in which both Morrow and Reese have both secured double-doubles. At Georgia Morrow stuffed the stat sheet with 16 points, 10 rebounds, a season-high 5 assists, 4 steals and 2 blocks.
Kentucky comes into the game sitting at No. 12 in the SEC standings and coming off a 30-point loss against Ole Miss on Thursday. The Wildcats have lost 8 of their last 10. Ajae Petty, who played at LSU for one season, is in her second year at Kentucky and is the team’s top player. She leads Kentucky with 14.4 points per game and 10.3 rebounds per game.