THE STORY: Kentucky’s seniors finished their home careers with a lightening start.
The Wildcats never slowed down, running LSU off the Rupp Arena floor, 95-64.
Kentucky buried six of its first 11 shots and opened up a 13-point lead after just more than five minutes left in the game. A quick 6-0 run by LSU cut the lead to eight with 11:47 play before halftime, and it never got closer.
In fact, it got a lot worse for the Tigers.
Kentucky swelled the lead to 20 with a 12-0 run. It got to 27 at the half, Kentucky’s largest halftime advantage in an SEC game this year. It helps when you score 50.
The Wildcats got buckets any way they wanted to. They finished the game with six dunks and 13 layups. That’s a rim finish every two minutes. They made 12 threes, some in transition, and some off their streamlined motion offense. They scored 46 in the paint and 18 off of LSU turnovers.
At no point did LSU offer any resistance.
Kentucky is great on offense. The Wildcats rolled up 106 on Florida in the SEC opener, 95 in Starkville and 81 on a tough Texas A&M defense.
LSU was completely unable to make the Wildcats uncomfortable.
On the other side of the floor, LSU’s turnover problems resurfaced for the first time in over a month, and the shooting slumped outside of Cam Carter who continues to be the only game in and game out scorer.
Freshman Robert Miller was able to have some success around the rim. He ended up leading the way with 15 points on 7-for-11 shooting in 20 minutes.
Carter buried for of six triples. The rest of the Tigers shot 2-for-16 (13%) from deep. It’s hard to keep up with anyone shooting like that.
LSU returns to the floor one final time in the regular season Saturday as Texas A&M comes to the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. What started as a season of hope and early promise has fizzled into a disaster that was punctuated by Tuesday’s drubbing.
Vyctorius Miller and Corey Chest did not play. With Jalen Reed and Tyrell Ward out for the season, LSU’s numbers are light.
Soon all eyes will be on the transfer portal to see if the program can turn around.
THE STATS: For the game Kentucky shot 51 percent from the floor, 12-for-32 (38%) from deep and 11-for-11 on free throws.
The ‘Cats shot 59 percent before halftime and made 7-for-14 threes.
Otega Oweh finished the game 9-for-11 from the floor and 6-for-6 from the line for a game-high 24 points.
LSU turned the ball over 16 times. Kentucky only had eight turnovers.
Kentucky loves to run. They scored 29 on the fastbreak to just 11 for LSU.
Curtis Givens was unable to make a field goal in five tries over 24 minutes.
