LSU Basketball Looks to Continue Fast Start to SEC Play With One Loss Arkansas Coming to Town

Don't expect any pats on the back from LSU coach Will Wade after the Tigers 78-64 SEC opening win over Tennessee. Wade and the LSU basketball team are still approaching the early part of the SEC schedule with a "backs to the wall" mentality.

"We’ve won two games. We lost two in a row before that, now we’ve won two in a row, so alright," Wade said. "Our backs are against the wall from now until March. We better come out scratching, clawing. We’ve got a lot of work to do and a lot of areas to improve and get better. We’ll keep that mentality. We’ve got to play with relentlessness. That’s how we’re going to be because that’s how I am from now until March.”

The Tigers have pulled out two straight wins after dropping back-to-back outings to East Tennessee State and USC. The wins over undefeated Liberty and a Tennessee team in a similar boat as the Tigers was a good start to climbing back into NCAA tournament relevancy.

With most of the SEC hovering around the same records, there are only two standout teams in non-conference play thus far, Auburn and Arkansas, led by first year coach Eric Musselman. In his first year, Musselman has taken a Razorback team that finished 18-16 overall and 8-10 in the SEC a year ago to a 12-1 non-conference record and playing very hard.

"The team plays extremely, extremely hard. They put you in some tough predicaments just with their spacing on offense and their shooting," Wade said. "I think they’re a team that will be in the hunt all year in the SEC, just because of how hard they play."

LSU has a chance Wednesday to make an early statement in the SEC with the Razorbacks coming to town, but in order to have a chance to come away with a win, valuing the basketball will be a priority.

Arkansas forces nearly 18 turnovers a game while LSU gives the ball away nearly 14 times a game, ranking outside the top-150 in all of college basketball.

There have been signs of improvement though as the Tigers have turned the ball over 14 times in the last two games, significantly better than their season average.

"We’re just getting a little more used to playing with each other. We haven’t really had the ball heated up a whole lot the past couple games," Wade said. "Arkansas, No. 3 (Desi Sills) he’s as good of an on ball defender that we’ve seen in the league. He’s going to pick us up three quarter court at least and work us up and down the court. I don’t expect we’ll turn it over as little as we have the last couple games, but we don’t need to be a whole lot more than that if we want to give ourselves a chance to win.”

Sophomore point guard Javonte Smart will likely be the guy Sills picks up for most of the game, particularly because of the way Smart's played the last few games. After a rough start in all areas, Smart in these last two wins, is averaging 18 points and five assists a game with only one turnover.

While that's a small sample size, it has looked like the sophomore has made great strides in recent weeks in taking better shots and not turning the ball over as frequently.

"He’s playing to his capabilities. He made shots at a high level in the Tennessee game which obviously helped us," Wade said. "But the main thing is his turnovers are down, his assists are up. I think he has a better understanding of what we’re asking him to do, who we’re asking him to be. I think he’s just getting a little more comfortable with that and feeling better just being a play maker. That’s his role. He needs to be a playmaker for us on offense and defense."

Despite three close losses to teams where LSU had second half leads, Wade still thinks the Tigers have set themselves up in a good position as SEC play starts to rev up.

“Obviously we would like to have a few more wins but our schedule sets up good and it’s been what we needed it to be," Wade said. "We need some of these guys that have beaten us to win games. I think we just have to win but we certainly are where we need to be numerically. I thought we could have been a little bit better than this if we had handled Southern California or East Tennessee or Utah State."

It'll be a late night Wednesday in the PMAC as tip-off between the Tigers and Razorbacks isn't slated until 8 p.m. with the game being broadcast on ESPNU.