The 9th ranked LSU Lady Tigers showed a lot of fight, but it was South Carolina who had poise down the stretch and left Baton Rouge with a 76-70 victory to remain undefeated.
The loss snaps LSU’s 29 game home winning streak, while South Carolina has won 15 straight against the Lady Tigers.
LSU came out on fire and led South Carolina 24-18 after the first quarter. But the Gamecocks settled in and grinded out the win.
LSU led by four going into the fourth quarter, but the Gamecocks outscored the Lady Tigers 24-14 in the final ten minutes.
“The difference in the game is that we are not tough enough yet, and they are, they outrebounded us in the second half, you got to grind, you have to go out and do it the whole game,” said LSU coach Kim Mulkey.
Aneesah Morrow had 16 points, but ten of those points came in the first half. Angel Reese had 15 points and eight rebounds. But fouled out with 4:02 left in the game.
South Carolina outscored LSU 11 to 3 the rest of the way.
“We got to make plays when we are tired, that comes with maturity and experience,” said Mulkey.
South Carolina’s Bree Hall hit two big three-pointers down the stretch and finished with 10 points. Chloe Kitts was the Gamecocks leading scorer with 14 points.
South Carolina shot 48% from the field, LSU was 45% from the field. Carolina was 7-20 from three-point land, LSU 6-18.
Mulkey said in the postgame that her team should have attacked the rim more. The Lady Tigers only shot nine free throws and made just four.
A lot of the focus will be on Reese fouling in the fourth quarter and how the game slipped away at that point.
But go back to the end of the first and second quarter. South Carolina hit a three-pointer right at the end of those quarters and those six points ended up being the difference.
Last year LSU didn’t get the rematch after losing to South Carolina, hopefully they get it this year.
