When the halftime buzzer sounded, things were going about as well as the Tigers had hoped for. They had No. 6 Kentucky right where they wanted them at a point in the season where a huge, top-10 win against an SEC juggernaut would work wonders for LSU’s seeding in the NCAA tournament.
And that’s when second-half LSU took the court.
LSU’s last couple of games have followed this trend:
They play great, controlled basketball in the first half and get out to a solid lead. Then, they come out of the gates completely flat in the second half, watching as the lead they had built themselves over twenty minutes of play vanishes.
Take the games against Texas A&M and Mississippi State as examples of that. Their opponents in those games combined for 38 points in the first half and 95 in the second, with LSU’s team resorting back to their previous season’s form, except without the help of Cameron Thomas.
And you can’t do that against Kentucky of all teams.
In this specific instance, LSU had one of its more impressive defensive performances in the first half, holding an offensively sound Kentucky squad to a season low of 23 points and jumping out to an eight-point lead in the process. On one hand, it felt like the Tigers had complete control of the game, but on the other, fans felt uneasy.
It’s like Pavlov’s experiment with conditioning. Just like when the dog starts salivating at the sound of the bell, LSU fans have been conditioned to feel dread at the start of the second half, and rightfully so.
Through four minutes of the period, LSU had unknowingly led for the last time, giving up an 11-0 run early on and never obtaining a grip on the game again. After starting the game shooting 5-7 from three, they would make just 4 of their 19 remaining threes, finishing the game shooting 34.6% in that regard and 36.8% from the field.
Other contributing factors included fouls and rebounding, as the Tigers sent Kentucky to the line to shoot a total of 32 free throws (thankfully making only 23 of them), and holding a double-digit deficit in the latter category by the end of the game. I could delve into LSU’s positives too, like its free throw percentage and assist totals, but they feel meaningless in the grand scheme of things.
It’s frustrating for everyone involved, but adjustments are a part of the game and if LSU can’t respond to their opponents’ halftime adjustments, they will continue to disappoint. It’s still unknown what exactly is causing LSU’s second-half collapses, but guesses include: lack of preparation or adjustment and overconfidence.
Head coach Will Wade harbored similar sentiments towards this ongoing trend, highlighting their defensive collapses in the past few weeks while also admitting that the team isn’t equipped to handle that offensively.
“A tale of two halves,” Wade mentioned. “This is like the fifth straight game we’ve given up 40+ points in the second half and you just can’t sustain that. Our offense is not good enough to overcome that.”
LSU has a couple more chances to finish the regular season on a good note, possibly propelling them to a six-seed come March. And as the regular season draws to a close, LSU fans are starting to feel the way they had grown accustomed to feeling during the early 2010 years of LSU basketball: disappointed and unsurprised.
