The suddenly hot Alabama Crimson Tide won their sixth straight game on Saturday, a 90-83 victory over LSU in Baton Rouge. The Bayou Bengals have struggled this year, but play tough at home. Any road win in the SEC is worth celebrating and this one gave the Tide a 20 win season for the fourth straight year. That mark was last hit from 1989-1992. Alabama improved to 20-7 overall and 10-4 in league play. LSU fell to 14-13 and 2-12 in the SEC.
Coach Nate Oats stayed with the starting five of Labaron Philon, Aden Holloway, Amari Allen. London Jemison, and Aiden Sherrell. Philon was banged up after playing 45 minutes in the victory over Arkansas on Wednesday, and didn’t practice during the week. The sophomore guard played the fewest minutes and his lowest scoring game of the season with eight points.
The game started out slowly with the Tide leading 6-4 with 16:37 left in the half. Taylor Bol Bowen hit a three at the 14:30 mark for a 9-6 Bama lead. Allen, Sherrell, and Houston Mallette all hit three pointers and the score was 24-21 in Alabama’s favor with 6:18 left. The Tide went on a to build a nine point lead with under a minute left in the frame, but the team fell asleep and the Tigers closed the margin to 43-40 at the break.
Alabama shot 12-24 in the first half with 5-13 from deep, fortunately the team was 14-14 at the charity stripe. Bama grabbed 14 rebounds, with two offensively, dished out seven assists, had four steals, one block, and turned it over four times. Holloway led the way with 10 points and three assists. Allen was next with seven points and Sherrell contributed five points, five rebounds, one block and one assist.
The Tigers were 14-35 from the field for 40%, but 7-14 from behind the arc. The home team was 5-6 at the charity stripe. LSU had 19 rebounds, eight assists, two blocks, three steals, and committed five turnovers. Marquel Sutton scored nine points to lead the team and was helped by seven Rashad King and Jalen Reece. Michael Nwoko scored only four but grabbed eight rebounds.
The same starters came out for the second half. The Tide started hot and shot out to a comfortable lead of 61-49, helped by threes from Sherrell, Allen, and Holloway. With 12 minutes left Bama led 65-51, and the margin remained comfortably, mostly. LSU didn’t quit, and started chipping away. With 3:55 left the Tide led 78-70. After a couple of missed free throws and some offensive rebounding by the Tigers things got a little more interesting with a 81-75 lead with 2:15 left. After a myriad of challenges and reviews, the last few minutes of the game took closer to 20 minutes to finish. In the end the Tide held on for the 90-83 win.
In the second half Bama shot 13-34 for 38%, just 5-17 from three for 29%, and 16-23 for 70% at the line. Overall the Tide finished 25-58 for 43%, 10-30 for 33% from distance, and 30-37 for 81% at the free throw line. Alabama got after it on the boards in the second half and finished with 39 rebounds -13 offensively . The team had 13 assists, four blocks, five steals, and eight turnovers. Holloway scored 17 with four assists, and two steals. The junior guard was joined in double figures by Allen with 16 points and six rebounds, Wrightsell with 14, which included 9-10 at the free throw line, Jemison with 12 points, six rebounds, and a steal, and Sherrell, who had his second consecutive double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds, while blocking four shots and dishing out three assists. Sherrell was plagued by foul trouble and did his damage in only 20 minutes of action.
LSU was 15-34 in the second half for 44%, 2-6 from deep, and 11-16 at the line. Overall the Tigers shot 42% on 29-69 shooting, 9-20 for 45% from deep, and 16-22 from the free throw line. The rebounding battle was even at 39, the Tigers also had 14 assists, four blocks, four steals, and gave the ball away 10 times. Sutton led all scorers with 21 points and grabbed six rebounds. Reece added 14 points, PJ Carter tossed in 13 points, King tallied 12, and Pablo Tamba had a big second half and notched a double-double of 12 points and 12 rebounds.
Another nice road win for Nate Oats squad. It would have been easy to have a hang over after the exciting two overtime victory over Arkansas, but Oats seems to have his team focused and playing hard. Holloway did a great job filling Philon’s role with the All-American limited. Sherrell was outstanding despite his low minute total, and was helped out tremendously by Jemison’s best game of his career. Mallette only scored six again, but his hustle and rebounding late in the game were big factors in the win.
Next up is a home game against another lower level SEC team, Mississippi State at home on Wednesday at 8 p.m. However any team with an explosive player like Josh Hubbard can be dangerous, so the Tide needs to remain focused. The game will be shown on ESPN2/ESPNU.
Roll Tide!