STARKVILLE — The little things will wear you out.
Those details are even more important in conference play, when opponents know your tendencies better than some of your teammates.
They’re magnified even finer when teams have a chance to make a statement and can’t hold a seven-point lead with more than six minutes to play.
That’s why the body language of Mississippi State seniors Catina Bett and Diamber Johnson was so expressive Thursday night following a 53-48 loss to LSU in Southeastern Conference women’s basketball action at Humphrey Coliseum.
With shoulders slumped, Bett and Johnson looked spent after chasing, running away, and banging bodies with the Lady Tigers.
Their comments were even more telling.
“LSU was not better than us. We beat ourselves,” Johnson said. “The little things — rebounding, executing — that is when they started to come back, when we weren’t doing those things.”
MSU (10-4, 0-1 SEC) led 40-31 with 9 minutes, 14 seconds to play and 46-39 with 6:14 to go following a jump shot by Bett (11 points, seven rebounds).
But on an evening when LSU (11-3, 2-0) held Johnson, the SEC’s leading scorer entering the game (18.3 points per game) to six points, MSU couldn’t seal the deal despite holding the Lady Tigers to their second-lowest shooting effort of the season (32.3 percent).
“It is just the little things, like (Johnson said),” Bett said. “We should have beat them.”
MSU, which was picked 11th by the media and the coaches in the preseason polls, couldn’t beat a bigger and more athletic opponent because it failed to box out at key moments, didn’t handle the basketball as well as it needed (15 turnovers) in key situations, and didn’t attack (2 of 8 from the free-throw line) enough even after LSU picked up its sixth team foul with 10:27 to go in the second half. Teams shoot a one-and-one bonus at the free-throw line on an opponent’s seventh foul.
MSU also couldn’t overcome an untimely scoring drought. The Lady Bulldogs led 16-9 in the first half and then rebounded from a scoreless run of 6:37 to take a 23-21 halftime lead. In the second-half, MSU didn’t score for the next 5:54 (0 for 6 from the field, three turnovers) after Bett’s jump shot late in the second half and watched as LSU used a 14-2 run to stretch its winning streak to eight in a row.
Krystal Forthan scored her only points when she rebounded a miss by Lasondra Barrett and converted a layup to give LSU a 47-46 lead with 1:58 remaining. The offensive rebound was one of four the Lady Tigers grabbed in the final 3:47, and gave them 23 for the game. LSU held a 43-41 rebounding edge.
“(Offensive rebounding) is extremely important, especially when you’re on the road,” LSU coach Nikki Caldwell said. “We have been plagued with turning the ball over quite a bit. When you’re on the road, that basketball may not bounce your way, so we have to give ourselves second and third opportunities, whether it is an easy putback or to get control of the time and possession of the game. I thought we did a great job of doing that, and, obviously, Krystal Forthan came up with a big-time offensive putback for us late in the game.”
Destini Hughes had a career-high 17 points to lead LSU. Barrett added 13 points and nine rebounds and Courtney Jones had 11 points and seven rebounds. Adrienne Webb also had eight points and nine rebounds.
MSU still had its chances following Forthan’s putback. Jones grabbed an offensive rebound that led to a free throw by Barrett that gave LSU a 48-46 lead with 1:02 to go. The Lady Bulldogs turned the ball over on their next possession, which led to two more free throws by Hughes with 35.8 seconds left.
Bett’s putback off a missed 3-pointer by Grant cut the deficit in half, but Hughes made a free throw and missed the second. Swayze Black tipped the offensive rebound free to Hughes, who hit the final two free throws with 10.4 seconds to account for the final margin.
Caldwell complimented her team, which lost at Tulane 65-62 in overtime on Nov. 19, for fighting and playing with the energy it needed to overcome 13 turnovers and an equally tenacious effort by MSU, which beat Tulane 70-55 on Dec. 4 in Starkville.
But MSU coach Sharon Fanning-Otis said her team was too passive, especially on offense. She said the Lady Bulldogs have to attack teams better to create easy shots so they can put opponents away.
“This would be an upset in our minds,” Fanning-Otis said. “You just have to win. You have to take care of business at home. It is frustrating, but you have to review it and get ready for the next game. .. It ought to tick them off enough as a team. It has to tick them off because they are the ones having to grind, to communicate, to get the rebound down the stretch, so it has to be they decide we’re going to get this done for a 40-minute period. Hopefully, we can step up to that challenge.”
Despite shooting only 34.5 percent, MSU delivered a focused effort on defense and worked its offense for good shots most of the game. Freshman guard Kendra Grant (seven rebounds) also had 11 points, but senior guard Porsha Porter (two points, 1 of 8 from the field) wasn’t at 100 percent due to an illness. Porter entered the game as the Lady Bulldogs’ second-leading scorer (15.3 ppg.).
“We didn’t do what we were supposed to do,” Johnson said. “We’re feeling the pain of regret. Hopefully, this feeling we all feel — you could tell in the locker room we hurt all across the board — (will help us) come out in practice and be more determined to work on the stuff and do the drills we hate doing. This proves why what (the coaches) keep jamming down our throats, why the little stuff is so important. Sometimes it takes losses like this for you to realize and to see how bad or there is something you need to work on.”
MSU will play at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at No. 11 Kentucky.
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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