How It Happened: LSU Basketball Crumbles In 91-62 Loss To Arkansas Razorbacks

BATON ROUGE – The No. 21 Arkansas Razorbacks scored the first eight points of the game and led by double digits five minutes in en route to a 91-62 win over the LSU Tigers Tuesday night at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.

Arkansas led by a 42-27 count at halftime and LSU could not get back in the game, struggling from both inside and outside the arc.

Marquel Sutton led LSU with 18 points and six rebounds, with Pablo Tamba adding 11 points and seven rebounds. Robert Miller III had 10 points and five boards.

Darius Acuff Jr., led Arkansas with 28 points and five assists. Meleek Thomas added 20 points with Trevon Brazile getting 14 points (12 rebounds, 5 blocks) and Billy Richmond III had 13 points.

Arkansas had 64 points in the paint to LSU’s 34. The Tigers did out rebound Arkansas, 43-36, including 21-8 on the offensive board.

The Razorbacks shot 56.5 percent for the game (35-of-62), including 18-of-28 (64.3 percent) in the second half. Arkansas was 3-of-12 from deep.

LSU shot just 30.9 percent (21-of-68) and 3-of-21 from the arc (14.3 percent). LSU was 17-of-27 at the free throw line for 63.0 percent.

LSU travels for the next two games, traveling to Knoxville to take on Tennessee at 5 p.m. CT before going to Austin to face Texas next Tuesday night at 8 p.m.

LSU Head Coach Matt McMahon
Opening Statement…
“Before I get to our, tremendous credit tonight to Arkansas. I thought they performed on an incredibly high level. The back court with two freshman guards in (Darius) Acuff Jr. and (Meleek) Thomas, they’re just fantastic. With Acuff, you throw different coverages at him, but he plays with great poise and he makes the right play it seems like 99% of the time. On the defensive side of the ball, we had some opportunities on the offensive glass and some opportunities around the rim, but their rim protection led by (Trevon) Brazile was strong and we could not finish around the basket. On a night where you’re really struggling from behind the three-point line, it’s difficult to keep up with their offensive firepower. Tremendous credit to Arkansas for a great performance. Injury wise – you saw Max Mackinnon injured his knee there. We don’t think it’s anything serious, but he’ll be evaluated in the morning and we’ll see where we stand from there moving forward.”

On the team’s performance tonight…
“I don’t think it was a lack of energy. There was a lack of execution at times, but I think tempo-wise that Arkansas’ efficiency in the half court with Acuff leading the charge there that we have to score some. You’re not going to hold them (defensively) – they average almost 90 points a game. They had 42 at the half, but we were 34% from the floor, two-of-10 from three-point range, and we were three-of-seven from the line and that doesn’t include the front end of a one-and-one free throw. We left some opportunities on the board and certainly wouldn’t have gone in (to half) with the lead, but we have to be a lot more efficient offensively in the first half to keep that single digit game going into the break.”

Fifth Year Senior Forward – Marquel Sutton
Do frustration build up in games like this….
“We have to stay together. A game like this we can’t separate from each other. We have to stay together. Play team basketball and show that our brotherhood is still in full effect.”

Arkansas makes so many layups…
“Like Pablo (Tamba) said beating us off the dribble. We were working on them cutting from the corner and the 45 cuts. They got a couple of those. I would just say beating us off the dribble and just being physical.”

Grad Student Forward – Pablo Tamba
Scoring around the basket and couldn’t find the bottom of the net
“It’s obviously disappointing since we work a lot on our game. But I think it was a thing of
confidence today. We weren’t really confident when we would go to the pin. Unlike what we did
at their place. I think at their place we were much more aggressive and confident in that area. I
think that what was missing today for sure.”

What does the team want to improve on…?
“I think we got to improve the most on our confidence. Obviously had a couple guys going down
throughout the season and that affected us. You can see on the court our guys doubting
themselves starting with me. I think we have to play with more confidence. I think we got to
know why we are here, what we represent, and that we have each other’s backs. We got to go out
there and do what you know like, for example this team came out here and was really just hooping and playing their game, confident. That’s what we have to do. We have done that before, and I know we can do it. We have to find the right mindset and the right way to approach the game. So, we can perform that way.”

Arkansas Head Coach John Calipari

Opening Statement
“I watched LSU’s last two games. I watched their win at South Carolina and how physical they played. I watched their Georgia game, where they were up 15 and had a chance to win the game. We played really good today. We really played good. We’ve had other games where we really played bad; it just wasn’t this game. This is more about us than it was about LSU.”

On the success of the defense tonight…
“We were so bad defensively two or three weeks ago. Some of the stuff we’ve had to do is go back to the basics of how my teams have guarded in the past. We had to do some different things in the pick and roll, and the pickup point, and how we presented ourselves defensively. We’ve been working on it. Rebounding, we have to keep getting better. Some of it, we just have to grab the ball. It has to mean something more. That’s made a difference in what we’re doing. We go from here with seven games. We could lose all seven. They’re all against the top of our league. Now, we’ll see if we get better, and maybe we get healthy now. Malique (Ewin) had to get four stitches. He has until Saturday, so hopefully he’ll be alright.”

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