Deciphering springtime propaganda

Published 6:00 pm Sunday, March 25, 2018

By American Press Staff

You see, this is exactly what I’m talking about.

This is why you should do everything in your power ­— short of casting a glance at the NBA — to ignore spring football.

You can’t really trust it.

Never mind that, for all the leaps and bounds science and technology have taken over the years, it’s still an elusive trick to figure out how good, improved or indifferent a team is or will be while it is playing against itself.

Sometimes it seems that the most important aspect of these 15 practices is to get the PR campaign solidly in place for what will be the summer’s official party line to explain why whatever went wrong last year will not be repeated, how everything is improved and how it’s a “night-and-day” difference.

LSU recently finished the halfway point of its spring chores and took a break for, well, the school’s spring break.

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It gives the coaches time to evaluate the midpoint of their work and mostly to hold their collective breath that there are no skirmishes in Destin or Gulf Shores that require their disciplinary attention.

But before leaving, Ed Orgeron did take care of one important talking point.

The offense is just fine.

So everybody take a deep breath and exhale.

Offense is always a touchy subject with the Tigers, and it’s all the more sensitive this offseason because a good portion of the fan base was, for some reason, underwhelmed with the hiring (from within, no “national search”) of Steve Ensminger as offensive coordinator.

My guess is Ensminger will do fine.

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But that’s not important now.

There were complications to be dealt with after LSU’s first scrimmage.

Despite all the secrecy surrounding it, some troubling news leaked out from several defensive players who couldn’t help but gloat that they’d shut out the offense in that scrimmage.

This, of course, sent shockwaves through the Twittersphere and your more intellectual message boards.

LSU fans never seem to fret about the defense. But there aren’t enough hours in the day for them to complain about the stale/boring/predictable offense.

It didn’t help that some of the defenders added that last spring they were dang near helpless in slowing down Matt Canada’s newly installed offense — the offense and the coordinator that Orgeron parted ways with after the season.

There was a real danger of panic setting in.

You see, told you they needed a national search for a real coordinator.

Not to worry.

The Tigers conveniently had another scrimmage before adjourning for spring break and it provided an excellent opportunity for crisis management.

The result was more predictable than any of Les Miles’ old offenses.

The headline from atop the official LSU website blared it out:

“Offense shines in LSU’s second scrimmage of the spring.”

Damage control at its best.

Nothing to see here, skeptics, please move along.

Of course, you have to take their word for it. No media or fans were allowed anywhere near this miraculous offensive comeback.

Never are.

For all we know, they had a big tickle party at practice that day.

“I thought the offense had a tremendous day,” Orgeron said afterward, and he backed it up with some eye-popping statistics, particularly from the passing game, which must have been fairly well unstoppable.

“The quarterbacks made tremendous improvement,” Orgeron said, crediting the much better protection from the offensive line for most of the success.

For a team that lost its top two receivers, it also sounds like the Tigers have more talented, playmaking pass catchers than they know what to do with.

But he also made it a point that they’ll find work for them “with all the four-wide sets” they plan to use.

“It wasn’t perfect, but we made tremendous improvements,” he said.

Not perfect? Well, you have to keep it believable.

Meanwhile, the quarterback charade continues apace, still disguised as a “battle” or “duel.”

Nobody’s buying it — rising sophomore Myles Brennan will be under center next fall unless all this talk of a wide-open passing game is another bluff.

Still …

“I’m waiting,” Orgeron said when asked if any of the three contenders had separated themselves. “Every day, every day.”

He did allow that “Myles had his best day” — 12 of 16 for 224 yards and two touchdowns, presumably numbers not pulled from a hat ­— but quickly added that Justin McMillan “had his best day Saturday” in the previous scrimmage.

Complicating matters, Lowell Narcisse “continues to improve.”

This is called music to fans’ ears.

Mostly, it’s called spring football.

Scooter Hobbs covers LSU

athletics. Email him at

shobbs@americanpress.com

      5d95e732-09e1-11e8-95f9-13b96418b2ab2018-02-04T19:00:00Zsports/mcneese,sportsLedoux scores career-high 34 to lead Cowboys

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      NATCHITOCHES — Sophomore shooting guard Kalob Ledoux continued his hot streak by scoring a career-high 34 points to lift McNeese State to a 75-62 victory over last-place Northwestern State Saturday afternoon at Prather Coliseum.

      Ledoux shot 12-for-19 from the field and 7-for-8 from behind the 3-point arc in his fourth consecutive game with at least 20 points. He also grabbed seven rebounds.

      “We needed every bit of those 34 points,” said McNeese head coach Dave Simmons. “When a kid is hot, you have to keep feeding him the basketball. That’s what we did with the unselfishness of our team.”

      McNeese forward Quatarrius Wilson said when a guy gets hot like Ledoux, it lifts the rest of the team.

      “He had a heck of a performance,” Wilson said. “We just kept feeding him the ball. He was our go-to guy. He was the guy who was on tonight.

      “It makes things very easy for the rest of us. Everybody was just focused on him so it opened up opportunities for other guys.”

      “Kaleb Ledoux had an unbelievable game, and Mr. Wilson was pretty amazing inside pulling rebounds,” said Demons coach Mike McConathy.

      McNeese (8-12, 5-5 Southland Conference) jumped out to a 32-19 lead with 7:42 left in the first half before going cold, scoring one more field goal for the remainder of the half.

      Simmons said the Cowboys have to find a way to play the way they did early in the game for a full 40 minutes.

      “When we can get up and down the floor the way we did in the first half, that’s when we’re probably at our best,” Simmons said. “We rebounded well and our defense was good.”

      The Cowboys were able to keep the damage to a minimum before halftime as they led the Demons (3-19, 0-11) 35-25 at a break, but their shooting woes continued into the early minutes of the second half, allowing NSU to get back into the game.

      The Demons, who lost their 14th consecutive game, got as close as five points with 6:28 left and kept it close until the Cowboys got hot and picked up their defensive intensity to run away and seal the victory.

      “We know we’re going to need more than that to win (the SLC) and keep winning basketball games,” Simmons said. “We just have to get our other guys (off the bench) up to speed, playing hard and to keep fighting.”

      Aside from Ledoux, Wilson finished with 13 points and point guard Jarren Greenwood had 11 points.

      Simmons said it was nice to see Greenwood and James Harvey back to form after shooting a combined 2-for-25 against Sam Houston State earlier in the week.

      “Those guys make us a lot better when they’re hitting shots,” Simmons said. “The bench gets up and guys get into the rotation more. You’re able to play a lot more guys.”

      NSU was led by forward Ishmael Lane with 14 points, seven rebounds and two steals. Shooting guard Iziahiah Sweeney also tallied 11 rebounds and two of NSU’s six assists.

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