The LSU basketball team rises and falls with Anthony Hickey.
For better or worse, the junior point guard’s play is the key for the Tigers. On a team becoming increasingly known for its powerful frontcourt, it’s actually the smallest man in the starting lineup that makes all the difference.
Since freshman forward Jarell Martin was inserted into the starting lineup against Kentucky, LSU has done a better job of playing inside-out offensively. This meant LSU needed to throw the ball into the paint early and often, which placed the onus on Hickey as a facilitator.
Before games against Kentucky and Arkansas, Hickey said for the team to thrive, he had to play under control and focus primarily on running the offense, and only after that try to find shots for himself.
It worked.
Johnny O’Bryant III and Jordan Mickey did most of the heavy lifting — scoring-wise — as Hickey combined for 12 assists and just one turnover in a pair of LSU victories. Hickey played the role of engineer on a well-running train.
But after a momentum-halting loss at Georgia, a defeat ear-marked by putrid defense, foul trouble and O’Bryant being a non-factor, that role changed.
In defeat, Hickey scored nine points on just seven shot attempts. Sometime between then and Saturday’s game against Auburn, Hickey had a conversation with Johnny Jones.
“He told me to just have fun and stop thinking so much,” Hickey said. “Just let the game come to me and run the team. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I just need to do whatever it takes to win the game.”
Against Auburn, that meant being more than a scorer. The visiting Tigers brought double-teams on any and every LSU player to get the ball in the post, which put the clamps on O’Bryant and Mickey early on and forced LSU to look elsewhere for points.
Martin’s hot first half kept the Tigers in the game early, but it was Hickey’s scoring that narrowed the deficit to one at halftime before erasing it altogether in the second half.
Hickey canned a 3-pointer on LSU’s first possession of the second half to take the lead. After buckets from O’Bryant and Mickey, Hickey drained another one from downtown to extend the lead.
During the span of a couple minutes, Hickey scored or assisted on eight points and sparked a 13-5 run that gave LSU a lead it never relinquished.
Those 3-pointers to start the second half both came on kick-out passes from O’Bryant. Hickey finished the game 5-for-7 from behind the arc with 17 points, his highest total since a November loss to Memphis.
“Guards are going to get a lot more shots now that everyone has scouted our bigs,” Hickey said. “It’s going to make us balanced when we are knocking down shots when they are guarding our bigs. That balance is what makes us dangerous.”
As Hickey and Andre Stringer knocked down shots in the second half, Auburn was forced to stop doubling the post. As a result, O’Bryant and Mickey each notched double-doubles and combined to score 24 of their 33 points after the break.
LSU is at its best when it is balanced between inside and out, which is dependent on Hickey. He must run the offense by feeding the ball inside, but at the same time he needs to be prepared to take and make perimeter shots when opponents pack the lane and dare him to shoot.
Hickey’s ability to adjust to what the defense gives him will be the key for LSU winning at home this season. But if the Tigers want to go make any real progress, he’s going to have to start doing it on the road as well.
James Moran is a 21-year-old mass communication senior from Beacon, N.Y.