Sinking with too many leaks
Published 7:42 pm Saturday, February 10, 2018
Fixes can’t come fast enough for LSU
<p class="p1">It’s always something for LSU basketball.</p><p class="p1">Stop one leak in the dike … and two more gushers coming pouring out behind you.</p><p class="p1">First-year head coach Will Wade thought his team couldn’t have played any harder than in Wednesday’s 73-64 loss at Florida.</p><p class="p1">Particularly on defense, a chronic problem for most of the season.</p><p class="p1">“Last week, we spent a lot of time on our defense, our offense had been playing well,” he said.</p><p class="p1">So, after the leading most of the first half and retaking the lead down the stretch, LSU went stone cold from the field over the last 4 minutes in frustrating loss.</p><p class="p1">“We plug one leak, then we take on the next leak and try to plug that -— the leak we just plugged the day before,” Wade said. “The water starts coming back through.”</p><p class="p1">“We haven’t been able to get (offense and defense) both on the same page. Our defense was a lot better. But our offense, we were just all out of whack.”</p><p class="p1">But Wade and the Tigers (13-10, 4-7 Southeastern Conference), will keep plugging away, beginning this afternoon when they host an Ole Miss team (11-13, 4-7) that goes to the Maravich Assembly Center on a four-game losing streak.</p><p class="p1">Like Florida — and LSU, for that matter — Ole Miss relies heavily on the 3-point shot.</p><p class="p1">Wednesday, Wade said, the Tigers, did a good job defending the Gators from beyond the arc, but it came at the expense of giving up 34 points in the paint.</p><p class="p1">And, he said, the offense will have to get better against a bigger Ole Miss team.</p><p class="p1">A start would be getting freshman point guard Tremont Waters untracked. The Tigers offense has flowed through the 5-foot-11 Waters most of the season.</p><p class="p1">When he has an off night, as he did at Florida with nine points on 3-of-15 shooting with four turnovers, the Tigers generally struggle.</p><p class="p1">In last week’s game against Arkansas, for instance, he had 27 points and 11 assists with four turnovers.</p><p class="p1">“There’s going to be ups and downs,” Wade said of relying so much on such a young players. “There’s going to be good and bad. That’s what we’re dealing with. When you’re a small guard like that and you’re not hitting shots, he becomes a lot easier to guard, and we become a lot easier to defend.”</p><p class="p1">Ole Miss has not won a road game, while LSU hasn’t won a conference game against any school not named Arkansas or Texas A&M.</p>
