LSU’s first true road test of the season comes with a long flight, a fast opponent and a whole lot of talent waiting in Spokane.
The Tigers are 3-0, but they still haven’t played away from home yet. That changes Saturday at No.
14 Gonzaga, with tipoff set for 2:30 p.m. central time on USA Sports inside the 12,638-seat Numerica Veterans Arena off campus. LSU made the smart move by heading to Spokane on Thursday instead of Friday, getting over the Mountain time zone and into Pacific time before the Federal Aviation Administration’s Friday national air travel ban tied to what the government is calling a “telecommunications outage.”
Now the Tigers have to deal with a Gonzaga team that Will Wade sees as a major step up.
“Guys, I’m telling you, he’s got a heck of a roster now,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said. “I mean, they might not be as talented as Duke, but it’s probably the second-most talented roster maybe in college basketball with who they have. I mean, I don’t think everybody knows the level of play that the kids they got from international ranks.”
Wade didn’t exactly buy that assessment.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t go with that,” Wade said on Wednesday before the Celebration Of Life ceremonies for LSU basketball coach Dale Brown at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. “He’s coach talking.”
Few has plenty of reasons to feel good about his group. Gonzaga went 31-4 last season, shared the West Coast Conference title at 16-2 and reached the NCAA Tournament for the 26th straight year before losing in the second round as the No. 3 seed to No. 11 seed Texas. That run includes two Final Fours with national runner-up finishes in 2017 and ’21, three Elite Eight appearances since 2015 and eight Sweet 16 trips.
This year’s team brings back two key pieces. Senior 6-foot-10 forward Braden Huff averaged 17.8 points and 5.6 rebounds last season and is putting up 15 points and 3.5 rebounds so far. Sophomore 6-7 guard Davis Fogle averaged 17.8 points and 5.8 rebounds a year ago and is now scoring 22 points with 4.5 rebounds a game.
Few also has added overseas talent of his own. Izan Almansa, a 6-10 junior forward from Marcia, Spain, is averaging 11 points and 4 rebounds. Massamba Diop, a 7-1 sophomore center from Senegal in West Africa, is putting up 9.5 points and 4.5 rebounds.
Wade’s roster has a strong international flavor too, and several of those newcomers have settled in quickly. Freshman 7-foot center Michael Ruzic is averaging 15.7 points and 7.3 rebounds.
Saliou Niang, a 6-8 junior forward, is at 11.7 points and 10.3 rebounds. Brice Dessert, a 7-0 center, is averaging 10 points and 5 rebounds.
Junior 7-3 center Gilad Levy has 3.3 points and fewer than one rebound per game.
LSU also has two transfers making an impact. Senior UCLA point guard Donovan Dent is averaging 13.7 points and 8.3 assists, and he already knows what Gonzaga can do after scoring 12 points with 10 assists in an 82-72 loss to the Bulldogs last Dec. 13 in Seattle. Senior Kentucky forward Mo Dioubate is averaging 12.7 points and 5 rebounds.
Few had praise for Wade as well.
“I’ve gotten to know Will over the years,” said Few, whose team beat Wade’s McNeese State squad 86-65 in the first round of the 2024 NCAA Tournament in Salt Lake City, Utah. “And I think he’s done a great job.
Every place he goes, he wins. He’s adapted to this current state of college basketball as good as any.”
LSU is riding a wave of three straight wins by 40 points or more, the first such stretch in program history, but the competition hasn’t exactly been elite. The Tigers beat LSU-New Orleans, Texas Southern and Louisiana Tech. Gonzaga is a different animal, and Wade didn’t hide that.
“I think I was the only one dumb enough to go up there and play them,” Wade said this week. “They tried to get everybody else.
It’s going to be one of the biggest challenges of our entire season, when you look at our schedule. So, great team, great program, and they’ve got great personnel.
It’ll be the first time we got against true bigs. They’ve got bigger guards, too.
We’re going to have to play way better than we’ve been playing. We’re going to have to be much tighter just to give ourselves a chance up there in that environment.”
Gonzaga is favored by 6.5 points, and Wade knows exactly what kind of game LSU is walking into.
“We’re going to have to play very clean basketball,” Wade said. “We have to keept them out of transition.
They play at one of the fastest rates in the country. Their teams always have.
They’re a sight to behold.”
The Bulldogs opened with a 78-72 win over No. 24 Purdue in Las Vegas on Nov. 2 and then rolled past New Mexico State 109-68 at home last Saturday. Wade said the film only tells part of the story.
“The tape doesn’t do justice to their transition offense and how physical their bigs are,” Wade said. “It’ll be a monumental challenge for us. Their pieces and parts fit really, really well.”
And then there’s the setting. Gonzaga is 190-9 in Spokane since 2012.
Wade had to pause when that number was put in front of him.
“They’re what?” he said.
Then came the comparison.
“This is like going to play at Kentucky or Florida,” he said after recovering from that stat. “We’ve been dilly-dallying around with these cats the last three games, and we’ve done what we need to do.
We’re jumping into the deep end now. We’ll see.
From there, we’ll have time to correct the good, the bad and the ugly.”
After Saturday, LSU’s schedule softens at home against Louisiana-Monroe on Nov. 18 and Queens of Charlotte, North Carolina, on Nov. 21 before picking back up against Arizona State on Nov. 25 in the Acrisure Series tournament in Palm Desert, California.
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