The Pinkie Previews LSU at Kentucky: Wink’s Breakdown

After last season’s 13-17 campaign, I don’t think anyone expected LSU to start out 12-1 in conference play this season. Yeah, many pundits picked them to finish first in the SEC West but we are talking about a division that didn’t really have a clear cut favorite.

They entered the 2007-08 season with high expectations. They were a year removed from the final four and had one of the best freshmen (Anthony Randolph) and best JUCO transfers (Marcus Thornton) coming in. But, then Tasmin Mitchell got hurt in Maui and the Tigers collapsed with their combined youth and John Brady’s inability to coach basketball.

They showed signs toward the end of the year last year, winning four of their last five regular season games, before bowing out to South Carolina in the SEC tournament and it looked as if they were finally coming together as a team, largely thanks to casting off the burden of having John Brady as coach (who really may be the worst coach to ever make it to the Final Four).

Twenty-eight games into this season and they have already clinched a share of the SEC regular season title and appear to be the only SEC lock for the NCAA Tournament. They have won 11 strait since losing their SEC opener at Alabama and are in the Top 5 in every offensive and defensive category in the league. John Brady always was able to recruit athletes but new head coach Trent Johnson has molded those athletes into a very balanced and competetive basketball team.

The Tigers are the only team in the SEC in the Top four in both scoring offense (4th, 77.0) and scoring defense (3rd, 65.1). They still have two starters with Final Four experience (Garrett Temple, Taz Mitchell-both Chris Rix Award Candidates, they are long and athletic, and they are gaining confidence with each victory. The latest coming at home in a big win over Florida that served as their introduction to a national audience. There’s no doubt that this game is a similar opportunity for them, playing on CBS in one of the most famous arena’s in the sport.

Even though they have been winning a lot lately, they haven’t been winning BY a lot; their last five wins have come by an average of 5.2 points. Contrast that with their first 7 SEC wins that came by an average of 17.3 points. They are not invincible, but they have learned how to come back from a deficit and win close games, which will prepare them for March. I do think this means that if UK shows up, they’re going to be in the game. We’ve learned that there’s no guaranteeing that.

LSU is led on the court by star guard Marcus Thornton. I’ve talked about Thornton in my SEC rundowns and him being overlooked as an elite SEC player. The senior transfer from Kilgore College was a Second Team All SEC selection last year is averaging 20.5 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 1.7 steals. He’s taking fewer shots and playing fewer minutes than last season, but has improved his scoring by a point per game. This is a credit to better shot selection and efficiency.

Devan Downey, Jodie Meeks, and Nick Calathes have hogged all the attention, but Marcus Thornton is as difficult a matchup as UK will face all season, and possible the most interesting. Thornton and Meeks are a natural matchup on the court. They’ll be guarding each other, and the way they defend the other is going to be just as important as how they play on offense. Both guys will kill you from three if you let them (you know about Jodie, but Thornton is shooting 39.7% and hitting over 2 a game).

LSU’s second leading scorer is 8th year (OK, 4th) junior Tasmin Mitchell. The forward is scoring 16.8 points a game on 54.8% shooting to go along with 7.3 rebounds a game. He’s a scary matchup for the ‘Cats. He’ll give trouble to Ramon Harris and Darius Miller with his size, and with the way Perry Stevenson has been playing lately, I’m not sure if he could do a thing about him. He’s enough trouble inside the arc, but mix in the fact that he’s 9-16 from three on the season, including 6-8 in his last 6 games. You have to get a hand in his face even when he’s 20 feet out.

Mitchell can blow up on you just easily as Thornton. He has 8 twenty point games on the season, including a 41 point game a couple weeks ago against Mississippi State. I know it’s been guards that have killed UK this season, but I think Jodie Meeks and Marcus Thornton are going to cancel eachother out. Tasmin Mitchell is who I’m really worried about.

The starting lineup is rounded out by guards Bo Spencer and Garrett Temple and center Chris Johnson. LSU has benefited from playing only 2 starting lineups all season (Terry Spencer started two games in place of Bo Spencer).

Bo Spencer joins Thornton and Mitchell in double figures, scoring 11.7 a game. He is a significant threat from three, shooting over 42% on the year. The Florida game was his second game back following an ankle injury that forced him to miss recent games against Mississippi and Arkansas.

Spencer is the smallest of the LSU starters at 6-1, but Garrett Temple handles the ball the majority of the time. It seems like it’s been years since LSU has had a true point guard, but they have certainly made due this year. Temple leads the club with 4.5 assists and he will fill up the stat sheet with rebounds and points as well. However, he is not a good shooter by any stretch. He’s shooting 36.1% from the field on the year and only 30.4% from three. Expect UK to dare him to shoot the ball.

Senior center Chris Johnson has put together a very solid season. He’s scoring 8.5 points a game to go along with 7.7 rebounds and 2.9 blocks, good for second in the conference.

The starters for LSU play the majority of the minutes (all but Johnson average more than 30 minutes), but the guys you can expect to see off the bench are guard Terry Martin, forward Quinton Thornton, and guard Chris Bass. None are going to wow you with offense, but they all come in and play solid defense and fit in well.

LSU does a good job taking care of the ball (29th nationally in turnover % according to KenPom.com) and they get after you on the offensive boards (28th in offensive rebounding %).  All of their starters except for Spencer average at least 1.4 offensive rebounds, so if UK doesn’t get in front of guys and block out, it’s going to be a long day tomorrow.

Like I said, I think UK can play with LSU if they show up, and I think they really could go either way on that front. As difficult as the week has been for UK fans, it has to have been even harder for the players. Who knows how in the loop they were about AJ, who by all accounts, is a very popular player.

I do think the crowd has the potential to make a big difference tomorrow. If the crowd has the same do or die attitude as they showed during the Florida game, I think it would be a huge postive for the team to know how supported they still are. However, if things don’t go well tomorrow, it could really get ugly in that building, worse even than it was for Mississippi State. Regardless, I say let’s control what we can and make it hard for LSU with a crowd every bit as loud as it was when Nick Calathes bricked those free throws.