These types of victories seem almost as sweet as winning a title.LSU’s win against Arkansas on Wednesday was the first win in 13 games and its first taste of victory in 51 long days. The win also doused any chance of LSU going into the history books for the wrong reasons.Are they complacent? Don’t suggest that to the players.”It’s going to be the same mindset we’ve been having all year,” said senior guard Tasmin Mitchell. “We’re trying to get over that hill right now. We’re going to keep working hard and try to finish strong until the end.”Freshman point guard Daron Populist agreed. Populist has seen an increased role in the past few weeks — the walk-on has seen 20 or more minutes of action in four of LSU’s last seven games.”It was a great win,” Populist said. “We needed it. We’re just ready to get onto the next game.”LSU coach Trent Johnson didn’t savor the win for long. Johnson said in the past he wasn’t concerned much about records — he just wants the team to get better.”We’re 1-12 right now,” Johnson said. “We have no reason to be overconfident. We have no reason to be complacent.”The Tigers don’t have much time to relish the victory. LSU (10-17, 1-12) travels to play Auburn (13-15, 4-9) on Saturday to face the other Tigers a second time this season.Mitchell could use this game to help him end his career on a high note after the dismal 12-game losing streak. His 16 points against the Razorbacks tie him for third place on LSU’s all-time scoring list with 1,942 points.Just 58 points separate Mitchell from becoming the third player in LSU history to score 2,000 points, following “Pistol” Pete Maravich and Durand “Rudy” Macklin.Mitchell isn’t focusing on his accolades just yet. He still has games to win.”I guess I’ll thank God for that,” Mitchell said. “We just have to continue to win games. It feels good to be up there with Pistol Pete, Howard Carter and Rudy [Macklin]. We have to win some games though. I’ll worry about the scoring thing after.”Mitchell might be more worried about Auburn’s firepower. LSU had trouble staying in front of Auburn’s guards last go-round, guards Johnson said “had a quickness and skill advantage” after their last meeting.Senior DeWayne Reed, senior Tay Waller and sophomore Frankie Sullivan torched LSU for 50 of the team’s 84 points in the high-scoring affair. Mitchell scored 38 points against Auburn in the loss and was one of the only reasons LSU stayed in the game.LSU’s defense has seemed to clamp down in recent games, though. A tenacious 2-3 zone defense proved to be a foil to Arkansas’ talented backcourt trio of sophomore guard Courtney Fortson and sophomore guard Rotnei Clarke.Johnson said the matchups will be different Saturday, though the effort is encouraging. Waller and Reed are seniors, whereas Fortson and Clarke are just sophomores.Don’t sleep on Auburn’s frontcourt, though. Versatile senior forward Lucas Hargrove remains a threat as a big man who can shoot from beyond the arc. He scored 14 points against LSU in the last meeting.”They’re a lot different in terms of their personnel than Arkansas,” Johnson said. “The key is that they have a four-man in Hargrove who’s able to play on the perimeter and throughout the high post very much like Tasmin can. They cause a lot of problems.”Clarke and Fortson, the Razorbacks’ top two scorers, could only help Arkansas muster 54 points against LSU. Arkansas had been averaging 79.2 points per game in its previous five contests.”We had to find something that was going to work for us,” said LSU junior guard Bo Spencer. “We just executed the zone. We still had some breakdowns, but for the most part, that’s what is working for us right now.”Johnson agreed. But he said the Tigers might have to stray away from the zone at points on Saturday. “I think for us to have success there’s going to be some times where we’ll have to play some man because they cause so many problems at four positions,” Johnson said.–Contact Chris Branch at [email protected]