By Hunt Palmer
THE STORY: A lot will be made of LSU’s shot selection on Wednesday night.
That’s part of the story, not the whole of it.
LSU allowed a Georgia team averaging 66 points per game and shooting the ball from three at a putrid 27 percent in SEC games to run up 81 points at Stegeman Coliseum.
The final score was 81-62, and the second half was hardly competitive.
That comes on the heels of Texas dropping 89 in the Assembly Center on Friday—the Longhorns’ highest point total since a mid-December matchup with New Orleans.
LSU’s defense has cracked, and that has led to back-to-back blowout losses to SEC teams under .500 in league play. While turnovers piled up and shots failed to fall in January, LSU’s first shot defense remained steady enough to keep the Tigers in games.
Defense is about athleticism, preparation, execution and effort—the last part being a big key. Rebounding is an effort stat, too. LSU lost the rebounding battle by 21.
Then comes the shot selection. Twenty-one of LSU’s first 26 shots came from downtown. LSU entered the game the worst three-point shooting team in the SEC.
It felt akin to Skip Bertman’s teams bunting or Les Miles’s teams flinging the ball all over the field. Playing to a proven weakness felt puzzling at best and lazy at worst.
Maybe it was fool’s gold. LSU made its first four threes and six of its first eight. Predictably, that cooled significantly as the game went on. LSU misfired on its last six threes of the first half and finished the game 12-for-33. That meant 6-for-24 after the sizzling start.
The Bulldogs took the lead with 9:21 to play in the first half and never trailed again. The halftime lead was six, and it swelled to 20 late in the game.
LSU’s players have preached since December how closely knit this group is. While they may be short on talent, they genuinely like each other’s company and were willing to fight in the face of early SEC losses.
Now the team is 1-8 in league play, and not even the most naïve or stubborn mind could sincerely suggest this is close to turning around. It’s headed downhill in the wrong direction and fast.
LSU will travel back into the morning on Thursday and have to turn around quickly for an Ole Miss team that scored 98 on Kentucky on Tuesday.
THE STATS: LSU attempted 33 threes and 25 twos.
LSU was 4-for-15 on layups, so the twos weren’t exactly easy
Jordan Sears, Cam Carter and Dji Bailey combined for four rebounds in 89 minutes.
Blue Cain, a Georgia guard, had 10 rebounds in 30 minutes.
LSU did not have a two-point field goal in the first 18 minutes of game time.
Carter dished out six assists.
Georgia won paint points 44-14.
