Staying hot
Tigers dominate S.C. for third straight win
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Three weeks ago, the LSU men’s basketball team saw its season reach a low point as the Tigers got hammered at home by No. 1-ranked Kentucky.
Since then, the Tigers’ season has seen an improbable turnaround. LSU has won four of its last five, capped by the season’s first Southeastern Conference road win Saturday at South Carolina, 68-58.
The Tigers won their third straight game overall, whipping South Carolina with a dominating performance inside, and improved to 16-10, 6-6 in the SEC, good for a tie for fourth in the conference standings with Mississippi State, Alabama and Tennessee. With the rest of the regular season featuring Georgia (3-8), Ole Miss (5-6), Tennessee (6-5) and Auburn (3-8), the numbers are just too fat to ignore.
“We’re not dwelling on it,” senior Storm Warren said, “As soon as you start thinking about things like that, you might slip up.”
Slipping up isn’t something that LSU is doing a whole lot of these days.
If LSU wins out, it will be 20-10 with 10 wins in the league. The SEC tournament is in New Orleans, where the Tigers could perhaps take advantage of a decidedly pro-LSU crowd. Win a couple there, maybe the NCAA tournament becomes likely.
Naturally, Warren, his teammates and coach Trent Johnson aren’t talking about it. The Tigers have only one notable win (then-No. 10 Marquette) and two bad losses to Coastal Carolina and South Alabama.
But the selection committee also looks at the finish to a season, and the Tigers are one of the hottest teams in the SEC.
“It’s all about competition,” Johnson said. “It’s all about the next play, the next game, the next practice. It’s a fistfight. We start talking about March and March Madness in November. For me, it’s always been about, ‘We survived this one, let’s move on to the next one.’ ”
The Tigers didn’t survive against the Gamecocks (10-16, 2-10). They whipped them.
Warren and Justin Hamilton combined for 30 points (Hamilton with a game-high 18) and 14 rebounds as they exerted their obvious size advantage over the inexperienced Gamecocks. LSU out-rebounded USC 36-23 and also got at least eight points from three other players as it bulldozed the Gamecocks.
The Tigers took advantage of a fortunate call, immediately after South Carolina’s Brenton Williams had received a pass and dunked on a breakaway. The sophomore was whistled for a technical foul for hanging on the rim. Andre Stringer swished two free throws, and Johnny O’Bryant slashed into the lane for layup to turn a 38-36 lead into 42-36.
O’Bryant scored the next four points and the Tigers were on a 10-2 run. The Gamecocks clawed back into it after Malik Cooke hit back-to-back 3-pointers, but Hamilton cleaned up a missed shot with a putback, and LSU stripped Bruce Ellington of the ball.
Ralston Turner pulled up on the arc and got the cross-court pass. His 3-pointer bottomed and took the rest of South Carolina’s air out of the building.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Johnson said of the tech. “One of the things that we’ve done a decent job of is playing games in four-minute segments and understanding in regard of what happens, negative or positive, the next possession is the most important thing.
“College basketball’s an emotional game. I just think there’s a side of this game where we need to let these guys be kids and let them enjoy it.”
Johnson planned to push the ball inside against USC’s lack of height, and it worked. Warren used his turnaround jump shot for 12 points, point guard Anthony Hickey added 10 and O’Bryant ended with eight.
“I’m comfortable coming off the bench,” said O’Bryant, who continues to recover from a broken bone in his hand that cost him five games. “My teammates did a great job of getting me the ball when I was hot.”
He was hot immediately after the technical, and LSU used it to continue its streak. After a 2-6 January, the Tigers are 4-1 in February.
“We learned a lot during that stretch,” Hamilton said.
Notes
LSU had 17 turnovers that provided 17 South Carolina points, but shot 49 percent from the field to overcome it. … The Tigers won their first SEC road game of the year after dropping their first five. … Turner scored all nine of his points on 3-pointers.