LEXINGTON, Ky. - Alex Poythress is more focused on helping Kentucky finish games strong no matter how he’s used, and the sophomore reserve forward emphatically proved it against Texas A&M.
Poythress scored a season-high 16 points as No. 14 Kentucky routed the Aggies 68-51 on Tuesday night.
Poythress and 7-foot freshman Dakari Johnson eagerly picked up the slack inside for Kentucky (14-4, 4-1 Southeastern Conference) with struggling 7-foot pivot man Willie Cauley-Stein limited by foul trouble. Poythress worked inside for baskets and got to the free throw line, hitting five consecutive shots during his 7-0 run that put the Wildcats up 44-33 with 14½ minutes remaining.
He was 4 of 7 from the field and had five rebounds and two blocks in 25 minutes.
“All of his hard work, extra work, and how he has been practicing is paying off,” freshman forward Julius Randle said. “I couldn’t be more happy for him.”
The game was Poythress’ third double-digit scoring effort in his past five outings, demonstrating his new comfort zone coming off the bench after starting 31 of 33 games as a freshman. Though he’s still trying to find a rhythm with his jumper, his energy and aggression have definitely improved after he passed on the NBA draft.
There’s certainly no doubting Poythress’ dedication and mindset.
“You get what you give,” Poythress said. “If you don’t work hard, bad things will happen. If you do work hard, good things will happen.”
Johnson added seven rebounds, six points and a career-high three blocks as the Wildcats out rebounded the Aggies 42-24 and were nearly even with them in the paint (30-32). The rebounding was a huge improvement for Kentucky after being dominated on the glass in Saturday’s victory over Tennessee.
James Young added 15 points and seven rebounds while Randle had 13 points with 11 rebounds for Kentucky, which shot 44 percent (22 of 50) from the field and was 18 of 27 at the free throw line. The Wildcats’ bench outscored the Aggies 25-13 and 15-4 in second-chance points.
They also committed more turnovers than Texas A&M (15-11) but offset those mistakes with solid play in other areas, with Poythress providing a big boost off the bench.
“We got (the lead) to 11 points because of him,” Kentucky coach John Calipari said of Poythress. “Then we made a play or two and all of a sudden it was 16, 17 points, but a lot of it was just him.”
Alex Caruso and Davonte Fitzgerald had 12 points each for Texas A&M (12-6, 3-2), which shot 37 percent in losing its second consecutive game.
LSU 77, MISSOURI 71
BATON ROUGE - A week ago, LSU failed to execute in the final minutes of regulation and dropped an overtime decision to Mississippi.
The results were the opposite for LSU against Missouri on Tuesday. Jordan Mickey scored four points and Anthony Hickey sank four consecutive free throws in the final minute and LSU held off the Tigers.
Hickey, who entered the game shooting 50 percent from the free-throw line, was fouled on purpose twice by Missouri. Hickey made his first pair of free throws to give LSU a 74-68 lead with 37 seconds remaining.
Following a three-pointer by Jabari Brown, Hickey was again fouled. Hickey sank two free throws with 17 seconds left to push LSU ahead 76-71.
Shavon Coleman led LSU (12-5, 3-2) with a season-high 19 points. Johnny O’Bryant added 16 points, while Andre Stringer had 12.
Sports, Pages 20 on 01/22/2014