After three-straight wins against better competition and multiple players returning from injury, the LSU men’s basketball team’s brightest days seemed to be ahead of them.
The Tigers regathered themselves after the Christmas holiday on Tuesday night to play their first game in seven days, and LSU (7-5 Southeastern Conference) found the holiday season to be over the hard way.
Wake Forest (9-3, 0-0 Atlantic Coast Conference) defeated LSU, 77-71, in front of 12,104 fans — the largest home crowd pre-New Year’s Day since Dec. 17, 1994 against UCLA (14,551) — on Tuesday night in the nonconference season finales for both teams.
Freshman forward Ben Simmons, quietly and bluntly, knew who to blame for the whiffed opportunity.
“We played bad,” Simmons, who led all scorers with 21 points, 12 rebounds, two assists and a team-leading five turnovers — three of which came in the first five minutes of the game, said.
“We didn’t have a good game. I think we lost the game. It came down to who wanted it more. Every game is a test. We knew they were a good team.”
Simmons led the Tigers in points and rebounds and attempted a season-high 16 free throws, which displeased Wake Forest senior forward Devin Thomas.
During portions of the first half and the majority of the second half, the 6-foot-10 Simmons was matched up against Wake Forest’s 6-foot-3 point guard Codi Miller-McIntyre.
McIntyre held Simmons to five shot attempts, and only one attempt in the first half, which was a victory, Thomas said.
“Codi [Miller-McIntyre] did a good job guarding Ben Simmons,” Thomas, who finished 16 points and seven rebounds, said. “Ben was getting every call tonight. Any other game I don’t think we get those calls called against us, but he’s the number one pick. It’s safe to say he’ll get those calls.”
Simmons was followed by sophomore forward Craig Victor with 19 points on 8-of-14 shooting, and senior guard Keith Hornsby with 13 points on 3-of-9 shooting, 2-of-5 from the three-point line.
Victor said LSU’s loss was because of what his team couldn’t do, and not what Wake Forest could do.
“I feel they didn’t do anything,” Victor said. “We lost this game because we didn’t execute, we didn’t rebound. We didn’t do the small things we needed to do. They didn’t really affect our game. We were the better team, but at the same time, we have to execute on the little things.”
“We don’t feel like we played that well as a team,” Thomas said, “but this was a good win for us.”
Turnovers and defensive rebounding — which were LSU’s keys to victory, LSU coach Johnny Jones said on Monday — plagued the Tigers to begin the game, and remained constant throughout the night.
LSU, sluggish and dull, stumbled its way to 10 first half turnovers and 17 for the game, while also being out-rebounded by seven total rebounds.
LSU, for the first time since the return of Hornsby and Victor from injury and ineligibility, lost the rebounding battle against a bigger, stronger, Wake Forest team.
The Demon Deacons persistence on the offensive glass troubled the smaller Tigers. LSU captured only five offensive rebounds compared to Wake Forest’s 12.
“Two areas that we have been addressing and thought were of concern were second-chance opportunities — offensive rebounds and put-backs — that was the difference in the second half,” Jones said.
On Monday, Jones said the keys to victory for the Tigers would be how they start the game after a seven-day break in on-court action — along with minimizing turnovers and defensive rebounding. The short hiatus’ have been a problem for LSU this season as the Tigers dropped their two toughest losses on six- and 12-day breaks in action before competing against Charleston and Houston on Nov. 30 and Dec. 13, respectively.
Now after the week-long break, the Tigers lost their biggest, and best, opportunity, Jones said.
“Tonight, we let a great opportunity against a very good basketball team get away from us here at home,” Jones said. “This is a place we must protect, and we did not do a great job of protecting our home court tonight.”
Wake Forest coach Danny Manning speaks in a post-game press conference after defeating LSU, 77-71, on Dec. 29.