Nov. 14—Braden Huff has never had more rebounds in a Gonzaga game.
He collected 13 against LSU on Saturday at Numerica Veterans Arena, four more than the senior’s previous high, but he, like his teammates, was left wanting more, especially in crunch time.
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The visiting Tigers caught and passed Gonzaga with a 10-1 closing run. Donovan Dent capped it with a 3-pointer with 1 second left in LSU’s 81-80 upset victory, stunning a packed house.
LSU’s offensive rebounding in the second half played a major role in its ability to stay in the game and ultimately rally from a 68-55 deficit. Exactly one-third of the Tigers’ second-half points, 14 of 42, came after offensive boards, a category Gonzaga dominated in the opening half.
“That’s not an excuse, especially that late in the game. You have to find your legs, it’s winning time,” said Huff, who logged 36 minutes, matching his season high vs. Purdue. “We’ve got to be more physical, more tough, limit them to one shot. Limit them to one shot it’s a different story and we’re a lot happier.”
Huff gave GU that 68-55 lead with 8:11 left with a soft-touch basket in the lane for the last of his 18 points. He operated with his typical effectiveness against LSU’s stout frontcourt, creating space with back-down post moves and finishing in the paint. He was 8 of 14 before missing his last two shots.
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“He’s a load, I love 13 (Izan Almansa) as well,” LSU coach Will Wade said. “I thought they played (Almansa) more than (Massamba) Diop in the second half just because of the ball-screen D, you’d have to ask coach (Mark) Few, and just his physicality.”
Wade last faced GU when he was the head coach at McNeese. He chose to double team Gonzaga’s frontcourt, led by Graham Ike and Anton Watson, in the Zags’ 86-65 first-round win in the 2024 NCAA Tournament.
Ike didn’t miss a shot and scored 16 points while Watson hung 13 points, 13 rebounds and nine assists on the Cowboys. Huff chipped in seven points in 16 minutes coming off the bench.
“We brought two people to all those guys and they just cut us up on the back side,” Wade recalled. “So (Saturday) we just tried to let them back us down and keep everybody attached so they didn’t get the cut with (Davis) Fogle and the other guys sneaking underneath.”
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“Huff is just a great player and he backed us down and scored enough, but we had enough resistance down there a few times that we were able to stop him. But he’s a phenomenal player.”
Huff did some damage with his six offensive rebounds. He scored on a pair of putbacks after Fogle misses in the first half. Huff scored 10 of his 18 points in the second half and he grabbed a couple of defensive rebounds during the Tigers’ comeback.
Huff, held without a rebound in 25 minutes in Gonzaga’s win over New Mexico State last Saturday, led the Zags in defensive (seven) and offensive (six) boards. LSU freshman Michael Ruzic was the only other player with double-digit rebounds (12).
None of that mattered to the senior forward after the Zags’ eight-point lead melted away in the final 3 minutes.
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“They’re a physical team,” Huff said. “We knew we had to be physical. Thirteen boards is cool, but at the end of the game we have to get some of those and close it out.
“Just have to find a way to win and just figure it out.”
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
