The LSU men’s basketball team has a penchant for the dramatic, but Wednesday night against South Carolina, the Tigers proved to the 9,518 in the PMAC that they just don’t quit.
A flurry of blocks and clutch free throw shooting in the final minute lifted the Tigers (16-4, 5-2 Southeastern Conference) past the Gamecocks (10-9, 1-6 SEC), 64-58, to get their third-straight SEC win and 10th win at home.
Four Tigers were in double figures, including a 16-point off-the-bench effort from sophomore guard Tim Quarterman. LSU’s post duo of sophomore forwards Jordan Mickey and Jarell Martin finished with 14 and 10 points, respectively, to go with six blocks apiece.
“We are fortunate that our guys, much like what they have done all year, did not take an opportunity to hang their head,” said LSU coach Johnny Jones. “They were able to dig a little bit deeper and make some big plays down the stretch offensively, and especially on the defensive end of the floor to make sure we got out of here with victory in front of a tremendous crowd.”
Mickey had three blocks in the final minute of the game, including one that forced a shot clock violation on South Carolina with 32 seconds left with the Tigers leading by only one. The other two came with less than 15 seconds to play and yielded two freebies from Quarterman to finally slam the door on the Gamecocks and send LSU fans into a frenzy.
The message was simple from Jones to his team, which again faced late-game tension with 30 seconds to play.
“He was telling us we need to just tough it out,” Mickey said. “We didn’t have our full roster tonight. We were able to tough it out. We were able to make some timely rebounds and come up with some big buckets.”
LSU seemed to be sorely missing freshman guard Jalyn Patterson, who missed the game after sustaining an injury against Vanderbilt on Jan. 24. Patterson, one of the Tigers’ top-bench contributors, had played extended minutes over the past two games after inconsistency from starting point guard Josh Gray.
Gray, though, who hadn’t registered a field goal through the first 17 minutes of the game, finally sparked the Tiger offense. His 3-pointer from the top of the key and drive to the basket on the Tigers’ next possession with less than three minutes put LSU ahead, 57-56.
Martin’s dunk two possessions later with 1:09 left was all the Tigers needed for the six-point victory.
After a five-second violation against the Tigers, Gray lost sight of his man on the Gamecock’s inbound play with less than 30 seconds to go. But junior guard Keith Hornsby recovered for his teammate, swatting freshman guard Marcus Stroman’s shot.
“He saved us. I had to thank him for that,” Gray said. “I should’ve known better. They did that [same] play right before that.”
The Tigers employed a 2-3 zone for most of the game to counteract the Gamecocks’ size and held them to a 34.4 percent clip from the field for the game.
Despite struggling in the early going, South Carolina made some adjustments to begin the second half. A 7-0 run capped off by sophomore guard Duane Notice’s three from the wing gave the Gamecocks a 40-34 advantage with 15:20 left in the second half. The Tigers immediately followed with a two-handed slam from Mickey on the baseline and a corner 3-ball from Quarterman to cut it to 40-39 with more than 14 minutes left in the second half.
From there, it was a back-and-forth affair.
Quarterman gave the Tigers the lead with a runner in the lane with less than 11 minutes to play. After a dunk from Mickey to give LSU a three-point lead with more than 10 minutes left, the Gamecocks went a 13-6 run capped off by a Michael Carrera’s 3-pointer with 4:34 to go.
