Tough times have set in for the LSU men’s basketball team.
 
The Tigers have lost four of their last five conference games and are in danger of missing out on the NCAA Tournament if they don’t turn things around quickly.
But the slate doesn’t get any easier when the No. 1 Kentucky Wildcats bring their talents to Baton Rouge on Saturday.
This is without a doubt the marquee game of the Tigers’ home schedule this season. Nationally ranked Marquette and Virginia were big games as well, but neither occurred while school was in session.
This game gives LSU students a chance to pack the PMAC to see one of the most talented college basketball teams in recent memory.
And I’m certainly not talking about LSU.
Kentucky coach John Calipari has his team running on all cylinders. The Wildcats have six players that average double figures, making it difficult to key on just one guy.
The team is chock full of future NBA talent.
NBADraft.net currently predicts six players from Kentucky being drafted in the 2012 NBA Draft, with five of them going in the first round.
Those five players being drafted in the first round would tie an NBA record for first-round picks set by none other than Kentucky in 2009 when John Wall, Demarcus Cousins, Eric Bledsoe, Patrick Patterson and Daniel Orton all went in round one.
Calipari has once again assembled a team that utilizes underclassmen. Not only does Calipari have the No. 1-ranked team in the country so far this season, but he was also able to haul in the No. 1 recruiting class in the nation last year — signs for a continuously bright future for the Wildcats.
Think about this for a second — Calipari’s 2011 signing class consisted of four players. Of those four players, the lowest-ranked incoming freshman was Kyle Wiltjer, who ESPN.com called the No. 19 recruit in the nation.
The other three true freshmen — Anthony Davis, Marquis Teague and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist — were all consensus top-10 recruits by the majority of recruiting websites.
Davis, Teague and Kidd-Gilchrist join sophomores Terrence Jones and Doron Lamb to make up one of the youngest starting lineups in the nation.
For Kentucky to have such a young lineup and a 20-1 record speaks volumes on how Calipari has learned to adapt to the new era of “one-and-done” college basketball. Even though I am vehemently against the “one-and-done” rule, I can’t deny how well Calipari has used it to his advantage at Kentucky.
He has been able to consistently recruit kids to campus by preaching wins and preparation for their future NBA careers. High school kids see a player like Derrick Rose — whom Calipari prepped at Memphis for a year — become the No. 1 pick in the draft, and they want a piece of that pie.
There is no reason the PMAC should not be sold out for this matchup against top-ranked Kentucky.
I was a freshman in 2008 when former LSU star Marcus Thornton took the SEC by storm and led the Tigers to the SEC Title. For those games, I sometimes had to get there an hour early just to be guaranteed an upper-level seat in the student section.
This year’s version of the student section at games has been lackluster at best. There have been games when I’ve only seen 10 or 20 students in attendance. The Tigers have not received any kind of significant support at home so far this season.
Here is my request for LSU students: Bring back the Deaf Dome — at least on Saturday.
 
Micah Bedard is a 21-year-old mass communication senior from Houma. Follow him on Twitter @DardDog.
 
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Contact Micah Bedard at [email protected]