There’s something suspicious surrounding the LSU men’s basketball team’s 10-game Southeastern Conference win streak.Wednesday’s win against Arkansas was LSU’s eighth game against the SEC West, and the conference’s other set of Tigers have yet to rear their heads on the schedule. Heading into tomorrow’s game against Auburn, LSU has played home and away against every other team in the division before playing Auburn once.”I always thought that was kind of weird, that we played most teams twice before we played Auburn,” said junior forward Tasmin Mitchell. “I asked [senior guard] Garrett [Temple] last week, ‘We don’t play Auburn?’ I really don’t understand that.”
While hardly earth-shattering, it’s a bit unusual compared to recent years. LSU and Auburn played at least once by Feb. 1 in each of the previous three seasons, and in 2008 the two played twice before the end of January.
“It’s a first time for me, that we play [Auburn] twice this late in the season,” said LSU coach Trent Johnson. “It almost feels like they aren’t a part of our league or we’re not a part of theirs considering what’s been going on.”LSU may be happy for a fresh face after the past few games.
The Tigers outscored their opponents by an average of 15 points in the first batch of SEC West games. That margin has dropped to 6.75 in the rematches, including the Feb. 11 double-overtime game at Mississippi State and Wednesday night’s scare against the Razorbacks.
“We’re playing with fire,” Johnson said. “If you play against good people and continue to play like we’re playing, it’s going to come up and bite you in the face.”
Much of that deals with the loss of sophomore point guard Bo Spencer. Spencer went down with a sprained ankle against Mississippi State and has been “day-to-day” ever since.     Spencer said he practiced for the first time since the injury on Thursday.
“He thinks he can play, but he thought he could play Wednesday,” Johnson said. “The key is how he adjusts if there’s any swelling or anything. If he is able to go I will probably start him because I won’t get him warmed up and sit him and give [the ankle] a chance to stiffen.”
LSU fans would have probably preferred to get Auburn out of the way in the early going of the conference season.
Auburn dropped three of four games to start SEC play but has rebounded with a four-game winning streak, including a last-second win against Tennessee on Feb. 7.
“We’re shooting the ball pretty consistently from the perimeter and our bench play has been solid,” said Auburn coach Jeff Lebo. “Even though we’re small, we’ve done a fairly good job of being even or winning a little bit on the rebounding margin.”
Three of Auburn’s four-straight wins have been at home, while its most recent road win was at last-place Georgia. A win at the PMAC would give LSU only its second home loss of the season.”They’ve played awfully well at home — I think 17-1,” Lebo said. “We’re going to go into a very tough environment against a team that’s got a lead on everybody for the overall SEC championship.”There may be more to celebrate during the upcoming holiday than just Fat Tuesday. With Tennessee and South Carolina both suffering losses Wednesday night, LSU can come within a game of the SEC title by beating Auburn and can clinch it with a win against Florida on Tuesday.
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Contact David Helman at [email protected]