No. 16 LSU opens SEC men's basketball gauntlet at No. 11 Auburn

There are various subplots surrounding No. 16 LSU SEC men’s basketball opener at No. 11 Auburn Wednesday night at 6 p.m., but there is one that hits especially close to home.

At 12-0, LSU is one win away from matching the 13-0 start of the 1999-2000 Tigers, who won the SEC championship powered by such players as All-SEC center Jabari Smith.

Standing in the way of Will Wade’s current squad equaling that feat is 11-1 Auburn, led by 6-10 freshman forward Jabari Smith Jr. who is already being considered as the possible No. 1 pick in the 2022 NBA draft.

The son of the former LSU star is averaging 16.2 points and 7.2 rebounds, is shooting 45.2 percent from 3-point range and has Wade’s full attention.

“I haven’t seen anybody better in college basketball,” Wade said of Smith Jr. “He’s a phenomenal, phenomenal, talent.”

Besides Smith and guard Devan Cambridge, Auburn has four transfers in its top six players including starting guards KD Johnson (Georgia) and Zep Jasper (College of Charleston), starting center Walker Kessler (North Carolina) and sixth-man guard Wendell Green Jr. (Eastern Kentucky).

“Kessler was a five-star McDonald's all-American,” Wade said. “He’s one of the best defenders in the country, blocks a ton of shots, finishes well around the rim and does a great job in their ball screen stuff.”

LSU is ranked first in the SEC and first nationally in field goal percentage defense (33.8 percent) and first in the league and second nationally in scoring defense allowing 54.1 points per game.

Auburn is the first team LSU has played this season that will have twin towers inside like Smith and Kessler. Off the bench, AU has some of last year’s starters including 6-8 forward Jaylin Williams and 6-10 sophomore Dylan Cardwell. Auburn leads the nation in blocked shots (7.7).

Among Wade’s biggest concerns is his team’s inexperience (besides senior guard Xavier Pinson and senior forward Darius Days) playing in a vicious road atmosphere that Wade lauds as the best in the SEC.

“Those are the two guys that have been in this type of environment and they're gonna have to go have to get us off to a good start,” Wade said of Missouri transfer Pinson and Days.

“We've got a bunch of newer guys. Some of our guys who played last year (during a COVID-19 season in mostly games closed to public attendance), they just played in front of cardboard cutouts. So, it's just going to be a lot different.”

Until LSU’s most recent game on Dec. 22 in a 95-60 win over Lipscomb, LSU had been able to dodge injuries in its eight-man playing rotation.

But Tigers’ sophomore forward Tari Eason, who’s averaging a team-leading 16.3 points and 7.5 rebounds coming off the bench, didn’t play against Lipscomb because of back spasm.

“I feel confident he’ll be ready to play (vs. Auburn),” Wade said.

Then in the second half vs. Lipscomb, Pinson hurt a knee in a collision in which he said he “got hit from behind, I heard my knee pop, but I think it’s fine.”

Wade is 2-2 against Auburn and its coach Bruce Pearl. Auburn and Vanderbilt are the only two SEC road venues Wade has not won in as LSU's coach.

“He’s a hell of a coach,” Wade said of Pearl. “I've spent a bunch of time with him. We've shared ideas before we got in the league together on different stuff. He runs a tremendous, tremendous, tremendous system.”

Auburn is the highest ranked team LSU has played in a SEC opener since facing No. 9 Kentucky in the 1974-75 league lidlifter.

Five of LSU's first seven SEC games are against four ranked teams – Auburn, No. 18 Kentucky (9-2), No. 14 Tennessee (9-2) twice and No. 19 Alabama (9-3).

LSU's other two league games in the opening month are against unranked Arkansas and unranked Florida. The Razorbacks and Gators were ranked as high as 10th and 14th respectively in week 4 of the Associated Press poll with both teams unbeaten at 6-0 each.

Arkansas is now 9-2 after losing two of its last three games to Oklahoma and Hofstra. Florida is 9-3, going 3-3 in its last six games with losses to Oklahoma, Texas Southern and Maryland.

“No league schedule is perfect,” Wade said. “You're either gonna be backloaded, front loaded, it's never just gonna spread out how you want it to spread out. That's just not the way it works.

"So, it just so happens you know we got a lot of tough games here on the front end. That's just the way it works. It's not some conspiracy theory. It is what it is.”