Mississippi State found out Wednesday in Baton Rouge what happens when it combines a 36.5 percent shooting night overall and 25 percent from long range with a -20 rebounding deficit, and the results weren’t pretty.
LSU (15-3, 3-1) beat the Bulldogs in every way imaginable, including the one that counts, 81-57. The Tigers handed State its worst loss of the season and pulled even atop the SEC Western Division.
Head coach Rick Stansbury said State had a tough time overcoming the experience of the LSU line-up.
“You could see where that experience played a big factor,” he said. “They were the better team tonight.”
The normally hot-shooting Bulldogs were ice cold from downtown, missing their first four attempts from beyond the arc while picking up no offensive rebounds in the first half. The Bulldogs relied on junior center Jarvis Varnado for a team-high 18 points.
On the defensive end Varnado, the nation’s leading shot blocker, was rendered ineffective. For only the sixth time in his career and the first time in 36 games, Varnado did not block a shot. To Varnado’s credit, however, LSU center Chris Johnson was held to two points.
Sophomore Ravern Johnson, the team’s leading longball shooter, hit State’s first three with 12:38 remaining in the first half, sparking an 8-2 run to cut LSU’s lead to two.
The Tigers once again pulled away, eventually expanding the lead to 13 on a three-pointer by sophomore point guard Bo Spencer.
State wouldn’t go into halftime without a fight, however, and ended the period on a 9-2 run to trim LSU’s halftime lead to six.
Varnado said the Bulldogs were fortunate the halftime lead wasn’t larger.
“I felt like we were playing bad to only be down six at the half,” he said. “I felt like going into the second half we could have won the game.”
That confidence could have come from State’s recent habit of starting strong in the second half. They did start strong, trimming LSU’s lead to three points before senior guard Marcus Thornton took over the game.
LSU went on a three-minute-plus tear in which it outscored the Bulldogs 22-7, almost entirely on Thornton’s hot hand.
Thornton buried four straight three-point attempts during this stretch to go with a steal, a dunk and a pair of free throws. Spencer added a pair of threes to push the Tiger lead to an insurmountable 21.
MSU junior guard Barry Stewart, who Stansbury calls his best defender, was responsible for covering Thornton.
“He had some tough shots; I put a hand in his face,” Stewart said. “I give the credit to his teammates; They set some good screens off the ball and got him open.”
Stansbury said Thornton’s performance wasn’t completely unexpected.
“[Thornton]’s had those kinds of games before. You hope you don’t have to be a part of one of them because there’s really nothing you can do,” Stansbury said. “He really got that game separated and from that point, we didn’t play with the poise we have to play with.”
LSU didn’t let off the gas, and MSU was powerless to stop the streaking Tigers.
From that point, the near-capacity announced crowd of 11,709 lost interest but for one thing: the free chicken Raising Cane’s gives away every time LSU scores 75 points at home. The fans got what they wanted as LSU became only the third team this season to reach that mark on the Bulldogs.