LSU basketball hasn't exactly been thriving since hiring head coach Matt McMahon four years ago. He's just 57-58 in his time with the Tigers, and has yet to reach an NCAA Tournament. So when his Athletic Director Verge Ausberry made an ominous statement about the coaches' job status, McMahon was left no choice but to coach for his job.
“We’ve already had some discussions about what the expectations are,” Ausberry said last week to the Baton Rouge Advocate. “One thing we want to do is make sure we’re in the NCAA Tournament. We made that very clear to Matt at the beginning of the year – that’s where we need to be.”
“If he doesn’t make it,” Ausberry said, “we’ll have to reevaluate.”
Mizzou walks into a hornets nest against LSU
Mizzou came out completely flat against an LSU team that was without their top scorer. LSU jumped out to a 10-0 run and the offense for Missouri just never came as LSU downed them 78-70. After starting 3-1 in conference play, including impressive wins over Florida and Kentucky, the Tigers now step back to 3-2 and 13-5 overall.
LSU clearly wanted this one more. Whether it be from their AD's ominous remarks or just pure desire to protect their home court, Mizzou felt like they never had a chance from the opening tip. While the free throws were back on track as the team shot 80% from the stripe, the rest of the offense disappeared in its place. It was the Tigers fourth time this season they failed to score more than 70 points, and they've now lost all four of those games.
Missouri's schedule won't be doing them any favors in the coming weeks. They'll have dates with No. 21 Georgia and No. 18 Alabama during the back half of January.