The Mississippi State men’s basketball team has had no shortage of games against opponents featuring elite defenses of late.
Texas Tech and Tennessee both boast top-five defenses in the nation per KenPom.com, and both were on the Bulldogs’ schedule in the past two weeks. So was Arkansas, with the country’s 25th-best unit.
Mississippi State lost all three games, not even breaking 65 points in any of the contests. And when it comes to top defenses, the Bulldogs aren’t getting a break anytime soon.
MSU (14-9, 5-5 Southeastern Conference) will travel to Baton Rouge to face LSU (17-7, 5-6 SEC) at 7 p.m. Saturday. The Tigers boast the No. 2 defense in Division I and steal the basketball at a higher rate than any team in the country.
But like Mississippi State, LSU is struggling. The Bayou Bengals have lost six of their past eight games. The only team they’ve beaten since Jan. 12 is Texas A&M.
The Tigers have suffered a pair of three-game losing streaks, one a whole lot more respectable than the other. The first skid featured losses at home against Arkansas, at Alabama and at Tennessee. After a home win over A&M, LSU lost at TCU, at home to Ole Miss and at Vanderbilt before winning Tuesday in College Station.
Mississippi State has been similarly struggling amid a lot of road games in the middle part of its conference slate. The Bulldogs have dropped four of five games after falling 72-63 to the Volunteers at home Wednesday night.
They’ve got eight games left to make a tournament case, and it starts Saturday against an LSU team that spent two months in the AP Top 25. The Tigers entered the rankings at No. 25 with an 8-0 record on Dec. 25 and were ranked 25th on Jan. 31 before falling out Monday.
LSU has gone just 5-7 since starting the season 12-0, including wins over top-100 teams Liberty, Belmont, Penn State, Wake Forest, Ohio and Louisiana Tech. After a loss at Auburn, the Tigers beat Kentucky and Tennessee back to back.
But point guard Xavier Pinson hurt his knee late in the win over the Volunteers, and LSU’s season went downhill from there. The Tigers have lost six of nine since then, even though the Missouri transfer returned against TCU in the Big 12/SEC Challenge.
Pinson played in the following game against Ole Miss, sat against Vanderbilt and returned Tuesday as LSU beat A&M 76-68. He averages 9.8 points, 4.0 assists and 1.7 steals per game.
LSU is led by a pair of forwards in Cincinnati transfer Tari Eason and senior Darius Days. Eason averages 16.3 points and 7 rebounds per game, while Days scores 13.2 points and grabs 7.8 rebounds per contest. The Tigers also have a pair of productive guards in Brandon Murray (10.2 ppg) and Eric Gaines (10.1 ppg).
Gaines leads the team in steals with 2.2 swipes per contest, no easy feat on a team leading the nation in the category. Seven LSU players average one steal or more per game.
LSU is also sixth in the country in block rate, but its shot defense is truly remarkable. The Tigers hold opponents to 28.2 percent shooting from 3 (ninth in the country) and somehow just 63.7 percent at the free throw line (second nationally.) LSU’s foes don’t fare much better on 2-point shots, shooting 45.6 percent (31st in Division I).
But LSU’s defense has been suspect in recent games, as the Tigers allowed 75 or more points to each of TCU, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt. None of those three teams possesses a top-100 offense.
Neither does LSU, whose offense ranks No. 112 nationally. The Tigers are an average shooting team with a turnover problem, which held them back early in the season. In three of its first four losses, LSU failed to break 60 points.
So there’s a clear path to victory for a Mississippi State team with the country’s No. 29 offense. If the Bulldogs can come home from Louisiana with their first road win of the season, it could help springboard a late-season run to the NCAA tournament.
Lose, though, and MSU’s recent skid will continue with time still running out.
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
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