This might be the worst LSU basketball game ever

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This might be the worst LSU basketball game ever

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Son, let me tell you about the LSU basketball teams that took the floor post-Lester Earl.

LSU is going to struggle anytime a team can shut down Baker. The guard play will be suspect all season. I was hoping for more out of Stewart but his game hasn't translated to the LSU offense.

I'm not a son, I am 67 years old and saw my first LSU basketball game before Pete hit town. This is still one of the worst displays I have ever seen.

You can only hope that somehow this beat down brings about some soul searching.
No way Wright, Baker, Stewart, Hannibal, Wilkinson, Fountain can play this bad every night.

One baffling thing is Syracuse shot 28% from the field in the first half, and were up by 5!

This team is not untalented. We aren't top of the SEC talent, but we aren't so untalented as to lose to Nicholls at home and Syracuse by 30. Our players last year were genuinely awful. Our freshman either didn't see the court (Tyrell and Shawn mainly, Corneilous was injured all year) or were still raw and underdeveloped (Reed). I was fine with giving McMahon a year of grace considering the circumstances of his hiring. The transfers we got in this year are much better than last year (besides KJ Williams). Will Baker is a better player than Kendal Coleman. Carlos Stewart and Jordan Wright are better than Juice Hill and Cam Hayes. But we're doing worse at this point in the season. This team has players that are decently skilled. But why are these players, despite being better, playing just as bad if not worse?? My problems with this team, and in my opinion why we see little success, stem from coaching.

There are two primary reasons why our teams see little success under McMahon:

1. McMahon consistently asks players to do things that simply aren't in their skillset or strength:
-Forcing Derek Fountain to start playing last year as a big man despite being a faceup four at MSU
-Forcing Cam Hayes into playing as an off ball wing despite being a PG
-Trying to make Adam Miller a volume shooter (although I will admit the overwhelming majority of his looks were schemed well and he was open the majority of the time, he just sucked and couldn't convert)
-Making Mike Williams a point guard despite being a SG in high school
-Forcing Carlos Stewart (6'1'') to play as an off ball shooting guard despite being a ball dominant combo guard at SC. Consistently forcing him to get exposed on defense because he's too short for his contest to make a difference in a switch everything defense
-Making Jordan Wright create his own shot and be "the guy" on offense despite this not being his role at Vandy.
-Limiting Tyrell Ward to an off ball corner sitter despite having an ability to drop the ball and create offense from all three levels

These are just a few of the points that came to mind when thinking of his poor assessment of his players' ability. The offensive and defensive scheme we run are viable in the context of college basketball. They just aren't viable with the players we have, and instead of changing the offensive and defensive schemes to conform to our players, McMahon attempts forcing his scheme on players who are better suited in a different system. And it's entirely his fault. He recruited them here, he assessed their talent. If they are unable to perform in his system it's his fault as a coach. Our players aren't that bad. They just look worse than they are due to McMahon's scheme.

2. McMahon often employs rotations/lineups that make no sense
Think about last year. Our starting lineup for the majority of the season was Juice Hill (5'11”), Adam Miller (6'3''), Cam Hayes (6'2''), Derek Fountain/Jalen Reed (6'10''), and KJ Williams (6'10''). That's employing three players 6'3'' or shorter, and one player below 6ft. Employing shorter players is fine as long as there is a defensive scheme in place to make up for this height discrepancy, such as employing help defense or a matchup zone. On offense, this is fine as long as these players can play off the ball and shoot consistently. Unfortunately, none of the 3 players could do such a thing. Pair this with the faceup 4 Derek Fountain forced to bang down low like a big man and it's a recipe for disaster. There were even lineups last year where those 3 guards saw the court at the same time with Trae Hannibal playing the 4. Multiple games in a row where Tyrell Ward didn't play. Multiple games where Shawn Phillips didn't play. Kendal Coleman played more than Shawn Phillips. Was anyone surprised when he randomly popped off at the SEC tournament? I sure as hell wasn't. What does McMahon not see in these guys who the rant begs to play?? When they finally do they show out. You saw it with Collins against North Florida this year before he got hurt.

Even looking to this year, our starting lineup consists of a 6'1'' SG who never played this role before. Why is he forced into this off-ball role where he is clearly struggling being forced into catch and shoot situations as an undersized player?? Go look at his highlights from SC, he was creating his own shot a lot- using his athleticism and shiftiness to mitigate his height discrepancy. He's forcing a PG to play SG.

And yes, I know that we’re struggling because we don't have Cook. But to be brutally honest, that's McMahon's fault too. As a coach, it's his responsibility to know the eligibility rules and the risk when constructing a roster. He put all his PG eggs into the Jalen Cook basket and it fricked us. And that's HIS FAULT. Do not blame the NCAA. It's McMahon's job to know the rules concerning two time transfers. He needed a contingency plan in place in case Cook’s waiver didn’t clear. But instead what did he do? He filled our roster with a bunch of forwards- and I know why. He has this infatuation with Jalen Reed. He thinks he's the second coming of LeBron the way he talks about him. Reed is solid and is definitely improving a lot, but you cannot expect him to ever be the primary playmaker or ball handler.

This roster is constructed around Cook with little thought in what would happen if his waiver didn’t clear. And to be completely honest, I don’t know if Cook is the solution to all our problems. I think he’s a great player, I’ve even taken trips down to NOLA to watch him play for Tulane. But McMahon is such a bad coach that he would find a way to lose even with Cook. We had one of the best players in the SEC in KJ and still only won 2 games.

I gotta agree, we missed about 6 layups and a ton of threes, had some big white dude named Drew in their for half the first half who has played about 5 minutes all year and we are still only down 5 or 6....that's how bad Syracuse is.

Then - the second half - i go take a shower come back and we're down 13, change the dial and come back and we're down 20. UGH!!

I asked to see development and improvement both as a team and individually. This game showed none of either.

Would someone please tell these mediocre players that they can't shoot 3's. Or at least, when you've only made 2 of 20 attempts there comes a time when you must simply drive to the basket and draw fouls. Much like the Syracuse kid did to us all night long.
Too many fouls, too many turnovers, too many missed shots and not enough talent to seriously compete with anyone.

I watched for 5 minutes and changed the channel. That’s 5 minutes more than I expected to spend on this shitty basketball program.