No. 9 Tennessee dominates LSU in Baton Rouge, 77-56
Rick Barnes had to make another lineup change for No. 9 Tennessee Saturday afternoon. The result stayed the same, though, with his team picking up another road win.
Josiah Jordan James scored a season-high 22 points, Zakai Zeigler finished with a double-double with 12 points and 10 assists and the red-hot Vols hit 12 times from the 3-point line in a dominant 77-56 win over LSU at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
Tennessee (16-3, 6-1 SEC), while winning in Baton Rouge for the first time since 2015, got another 10 points from Julian Phillips. Tyreke Key scored 10 and Santiago Vescovi had six as both senior guards returned after missing the 70-59 win at Mississippi State on Tuesday.
Vescovi (shoulder) and Key (illness) returned, 7-foot-1 senior center Uros Plavsic missed the game after becoming ill Friday night.
LSU (12-7, 1-6) got 16 points and four rebounds from KJ Williams.
Tennessee stretched the lead to 25 on a Zeigler layup with 12:40 left, after James hit a three on the previous possession. Zeigler scored five straight over 27 seconds, with another layup and then a three, to get the lead to 21 with 15:04 left.
James had eight points, going 2-for-2 from the 3-point line, in the first six minutes of the second half. Zeigler had seven points, going 3-for-3 from the field, in the first eight minutes of the second half.
James finished 9-for-16 from the field and 4-for-6 from the 3-point line. Phillips, Zeigler, Key and Vescovi hit two 3-pointers each.
Vols led by as many as 17 points during dominant first half
Josiah-Jordan James had eight Tennessee scorers in the first half with10 points, helping the Vols to a 39-22 lead at halftime. James was 4-for-8 from the field and 2-for-3 at the 3-point line.
Tennessee shot 42.1 percent from the 3-point line as a team, going 8-for-19 and closed the half on a 12-2 run. The Vols scored 15 points off 10 LSU turnovers while committing only three turnovers themselves.
Julian Phillips scored eight points despite picking up two fouls in the first four minutes.
LSU had a stretch of nine minutes without a made shot from the floor and a stretch of seven minutes, 18 seconds without scoring.
Tennessee stretched its head to double-digits, at 37-27, on a James three with 4:39 left in the half. Tyreke Key hit two threes in the final three minutes and James scored with six seconds left in the half to go to the break with a 17-point lead.
Up Next: No. 9 Tennessee vs. Georgia, Wednesday, 7 p.m. ET, SEC Network
The Vols are back for two home games this week at Thompson-Boling Arena, hosting Georgia on Wednesday and No. 7 Texas on Saturday.
Tennessee will tipoff against Georgia at 7 p.m. Eastern Time Wednesday on SEC Network. The Big 12-SEC Challenge game against Texas will be a 6 p.m. ET start Saturday on ESPN.
The February schedule starts at Florida on February 1, then a home date with Auburn on February 4 and a trip to Vanderbilt on February 8. Thompson-Boling is sold out for the Texas, Auburn and Alabama (February 15) games.
