Green leads Alabama past LSU 66-49
Published 7:36 pm Saturday, January 9, 2010
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — JaMychal Green scored 14 points and Alabama stretched its winning streak to four games with a 66-49 victory over LSU on Saturday night in the Southeastern Conference opener for both teams.
Senario Hillman scored 13 points and Mikhail Torrance 12 for the Crimson Tide (11-4, 1-0), which led by double digits early and by as much as 26 points in the second half en route to its fifth victory in six games.
Green, who entered the game shooting 56 percent for the season, was 6 of 11 from the field against the Tigers, hitting an array of short jump hooks and graceful turnaround jumpers from the lane.
Bo Spencer scored 13 and Tasmin Mitchell had 11 points and nine rebounds for LSU (9-6, 0-1), which has lost four of five games.
Dennis Harris added 12 points for the Tigers.
LSU shot below 40 percent throughout, missing its first 11 3-point attempts before Chris Bass hit one with a little more than 10 minutes to go. By then, the Tigers were down 52-31.
Rebuilding without three starters and its top two reserves from last season, LSU has struggled against teams from major conferences and could be in for a rough road in the SEC, one year after winning the league’s regular season title.
The loss to the Tide was LSU’s fourth by double-digits this season, with the others coming against Connecticut, Arizona State and Xavier.
Alabama dominated the inside, outscoring the Tigers 38-16 in the paint and outrebounding LSU 37-27.
LSU shot 33 percent (8 of 24) during the first half and it didn’t take long for Alabama to pull away.
Hillman’s reverse layup began a 17-4 run, capped by Green’s turnaround in the lane, giving Alabama a 21-10 lead.
Green scored 12 points in the first half, hitting a jump hook and mid-range jumper during an 8-2 Alabama run to close out the first 20 minutes.
LSU had 10 turnovers in the first half, the last setting up Tony Mitchell’s breakaway dunk, which made it 33-18 at halftime.
Hillman’s jumper capped a 14-4 Alabama run early in the second half, putting the Tide up 56-26.