LSU Basketball Earns No. 3 Seed in SEC Tournament Following Georgia Win

LSU coach Will Wade has said for weeks, through all of the recent struggles that earning a double-bye in the SEC tournament was the first of many goals his team needed to accomplish to ensure an NCAA bid. Well after Saturday's 94-64 win over Georgia combined with a 71-70 Florida loss to Kentucky, LSU can check one of its goals off the list.

The Tigers (21-10, 12-6) earned the No. 3 seed in next week's SEC tournament with only No. 6 Kentucky and No. 17 Auburn seeded higher. A full breakdown of the SEC tournament can be found here.

Holding the No. 3 seed, LSU will play the winner of the No. 6 seed South Carolina Gamecocks and whichever team wins the Wednesday game between No. 14 seed Vanderbilt and No. 11 seed Arkansas. LSU went a combined 2-2 against those three teams this season, allowing an average of just over 90 points a game.

Senior guard Skylar Mays said after the win over the Bulldogs that Wade likes to break the entirety of the season into three segments: non-conference, conference and postseason play. Well LSU has reached that final stretch and starting next Friday, it's win or go home.

"We're starting fresh, everybody's at zero-zero but we're glad we have momentum heading into SEC play though," Mays said. "I said after the Arkansas game, which definitely wasn’t our best game, we are a dangerous team when we get things going, come out the right way, and think of defense first. I think they only scored 64 points today, so when we think defense first, we are one of the better teams in the country. We definitely have some momentum going into the SEC tournament and we are looking to do big things in Nashville.”

Wade said all of the Tigers' effort will be poured into winning that first game on Friday because it's the one that is usually the toughest, particularly when a team has earned a double bye.

"Well you're moving into the next phase of things and in tournament play I've always said this is true, I've been fortunate to be a part of a lot of teams that have advanced deep in tournaments," Wade said. "The hardest game to win's the first one, you got to win the first one and so that Friday game, you've got to put everything into that because that's the one game where the other team kind of has the advantage because they played the day before.

"Once you win that first one, you just kind of get it rolling downhill from there, but we've got to play better."

It's been five years since the Tigers actually advanced in the SEC tournament, beating Tennessee 84-75 in Ben Simmons’ one and only year in Baton Rouge. As a program the team has won the SEC tournament just once, back in 1980 but Wade said earning that double bye gives LSU as good a chance as any.

"We've got a puncher's chance but we have to put everything we have into Friday's game whoever that may be," Wade said. "We've got a good team and have as good a chance as anybody else who rolls into Nashville."