Coming off a 72-48 drubbing at Ole Miss Feb. 25, the LSU men’s basketball team can’t afford another distraction.
Unfortunately for the Tigers (17-11, 7-7 Southeastern Conference), who will host Tennessee tonight, Senior Night festivities rarely inspire a team’s finest effort.
“I don’t know how I’ll respond out there,” said senior guard Chris Bass. “I’m trying not to think about it, but I know I’ll be emotional. I’m not trying to get around it.”
The Tigers will need to get around more than their emotions tonight. They’ll have to overcome the surging Volunteers (16-13, 8-6), who sit a game ahead of LSU in the bottlenecked SEC standings and have won seven of their last eight games.
“Tennessee is extremely, extremely physical,” said LSU coach Trent Johnson. “Their mental and physical toughness has been very impressive throughout the year. This will probably be as physical of a group we will play all season.”
The Volunteers also haven’t fed on league bottom-feeders during their recent wins.
Since losing by 25 points at No. 1 Kentucky on Jan. 31, Tennessee has routed Arkansas, notched a road victory at No. 7 Florida and handily dispatched the same Ole Miss team that recently destroyed LSU.
While sophomore guard Trae Golden and junior forward Jeronne Maymon carry the scoring load for Tennessee, the Volunteers’ spark plug has been freshman forward Jarnell Stokes.
Under first-year coach Cuonzo Martin, UT began the season 5-6 and stumbled to a 1-2 start in the SEC before Stokes became eligible in the spring semester.
The 6-foot-8 youngster has given the Volunteers a versatile
inside presence — being as efficient handling the ball as he is scoring it — averaging 8.4 points, two assists and seven rebounds in 12 games.
“Physically, Stokes is imposing,” Johnson said. “He has great hands. Obviously, he has a level of toughness to him from a mental standpoint. It was not a secret that he was going to be ready to have an immediate impact.”
Stokes is a key cog in Tennessee’s physical frontline, which out-rebounds opponents by an average of four boards per game.
It’s hardly an interior to snap out of a funk against, but that will be the task for LSU junior center Justin Hamilton, who is coming off a season-low two points in the blowout loss to the Rebels.
“You have to attribute [Justin’s recent] play to how teams are guarding him and what we haven’t been doing in terms of going inside-out offensively,” Johnson said. “Teams are aggressively double-teaming him. He has to pass better, and our guys need to rotate quicker to help him.’
Hamilton averaged 16.2 points per game in 2012’s first 13 contests. He scored a total of nine points in LSU’s last two games.
In addition to Bass — a fourth-year point guard and brother of former LSU great Brandon Bass — the game is also the final home outing for senior forwards Storm Warren and Malcolm White.
Warren is a four-year letterman who ranks among the top-20 active SEC scorers, while White is a second-year transfer from Ole Miss.
“Those three guys have been a focal part of this program with their leadership and the kind of men they have grown into,” Johnson said. “It is real important that, as a group, we put our best foot forward to make sure they leave on a good note.”
 
____
Contact Chris Abshire at [email protected]