Credit to 12thman.com
BRYAN-COLLEGE STATION, Texas — The Texas A&M men’s basketball team fell 68-53 to the LSU Tigers in the SEC opener for both teams in front of a crowd of 10,525 on Saturday at Reed Arena.
The Aggies fell to 9-5 and 0-2 in the SEC, while the Tigers improved to 9-5 and 1-0 in league play. The loss snapped the Aggies’ 12-game home winning streak against conference opponents, which was the second-longest in school history.
Down two at halftime, the Tigers came out hot with the first eight points of the second half before the Aggies’ first bucket at the 16:57 mark. A three-point play by junior Wade Taylor IV got the Aggies within two at 11:52, but the Tigers went on a 9-0 run that the Aggies couldn’t overcome.
Taylor IV led all scorers with 23 points and made a career-high six steals along with six rebounds. Back in the starting lineup, graduate Tyrece Radford chipped in 11 points and pulled down six rebounds, including four offensive boards.
The Aggies had a poor shooting night as they hit 25.4% for the game. The nation’s top offensive rebounding team entering the game, the Aggies pulled down only 13 offensive boards on the 44 missed shots. The Maroon & White suffered its season low with just three second-chance points. The Aggies were out-rebounded by their opponent on the offensive glass for only the second time this season as LSU had a 14-13 advantage.
Texas A&M took a narrow 32-30 lead into halftime with Taylor IV leading the way with 11 points on 4-of-9 shooting, including a trey. Jace Carter and Tyrece Radford chipped in four rebounds each and Hayden Hefner had a trio of assists. With the score knotted at 30-30 and the clock winding down, Hefner drew a foul with less than a second on the clock and hit a pair of free throws for the two-point advantage at halftime.
GAME NOTES:
TAYLOR REACHES 150: Wade Taylor IV became the seventh player in school history to tally 150 3-pointers for his career with a trio of treys against the Tigers. The junior guard now has 152 in 89 career games. He’s the first to reach 150 since D.J. Hogg did it in 2018. Taylor had a game-high 23 points while tying his season-high of six rebounds and his career high in steals with six.
DOUBLE DIGITS FOR BOOTS: Tyrece Radford has had back-to-back double-digit scoring games since he has returned to action after missing five of six games after the ESPN Events Invitational at Thanksgiving. With the 11 points scored tonight, he has now joined the 1,000-point club at Texas A&M with 1,006 in 84 games. Including his points from two seasons at Virginia Tech, Radford now has 1,551 points in his total career.
STREAK COMES TO AN END: The loss snapped the Aggies’ 12-game home winningest streak against conference opponents, which was the second-longest in school history. The streak trailed only the 21-game home winning streak against Southwest Conference opponents by Bob Rogers’ Aggies over parts of four seasons from 1960-63.