Feb 9, 2002
By MARY FOSTER
AP Sports Writer
BATON ROUGE, La. – Kentucky’s Tayshaun Prince certainly impressed LSU coach John Brady.
“Prince is an outstanding player,” Brady said. “If I would have been his agent, he would have gone pro last year.”
That would have made a big difference for Brady on Saturday as Prince scored 18 points and blocked six shots to lead No. 7 Kentucky to a 68-56 victory over the Tigers, their sixth straight loss.
“It was just one of those days,” Prince said. “Shots were falling at the beginning of the game. I thought that when they went zone we knocked our shots down and got it inside so they had to change defense.”
The Wildcats, coming off an overtime loss to Tennessee, had little trouble against the overmatched Tigers.
LSU, playing without injured Collis Temple III, and fighting the same scoring troubles that have bothered them throughout the losing streak, trailed by as many as 18 points in the first half and 21 in the second.
“I know LSU was a little short-handed,” Kentucky coach Tubby Smith said. “Without Collis, they’re not the same team.”
The Tigers struggled against Kentucky’s zone and shot just 33 percent from the field.
“We knew they like to attack the basket so we tried to limit them to jump shots,” Kentucky forward Chuck Hayes said.
It was the 11th time this season that Kentucky has held an opponent under 40 percent shooting and the fifth time it was less than 35 percent.
Kentucky (16-6, 6-4 Southeastern Conference), which held halftime leads in four of its six losses, easily hung on to it against the Tigers.
LSU (12-11, 2-8) made a run early in the second half, playing scrappy fullcourt defense to get within 51-41 on Jermaine Williams’ steal and jam with 14:06 left.
But LSU did not score again until Ronald Dupree’s basket with 8:31 remaining. Kentucky’s 10-0 run gave it a 61-43 lead.
“I don’t think we’re mature enough to feed off that dunk,” Dupree said. “We got emotional, but we couldn’t capitalize.”
Prince had 14 points in the first half, going 4-of-4 from 3-point range. He missed four 3-point attempts in the second half.
“I had good roll going,” Prince said. “Then they changed their defense to man-to-man and we got the ball to a lot of different people who contributed.”
Jules Camara had 12 points for Kentucky, while Gerald Fitch had 11. Cliff Hawkins had nine of the Wildcats’ 18 assists.
Dupree led LSU with 22 points and 13 rebounds, his fourth straight double-double in league play. Torris Bright, who was 4-for-9 from 3-point range, had 17 points.
“We need to find someone who can score the ball other than Ronald Dupree and Torris Bright,” Brady said.
LSU outrebounded the Wildcats 42-34.
Kentucky outshot LSU 47 percent to 32 percent in the first half to take a 42-28 lead.
