Photo By Ignacio Murillo | The Daily Mississippian
Ole Miss will host LSU Wednesday night and get a much-needed boost in the return of their leading scorer.
Senior guard Marshall Henderson will be back after serving the final game of his suspension over the weekend. He missed the season opener against Troy and the first two Southeastern Conference games against Auburn and Mississippi State.
In his absence, Ole Miss faced a ton of zone defense from Mississippi State and struggled mightily. But teams do not play zone defense when Henderson is on the court. His presence alone will make offense easier for the Rebels.
“When Marshall’s in the game and starts scoring threes, that’s our salvation,” freshman forward Sebastian Saiz said. “When we’re struggling to score and Marshall scores a couple crazy shots that he (always does), that’s our salvation.”
But without him, junior guard Jarvis Summers faced the pressure of being the top scorer. In the three games that Henderson missed, Summers scored 21.7 points per game and attempted 17 shots per game – 1.28 points per shot. In games with Henderson, Summers’ efficiency is higher as he has scored 16.9 points on 9.6 shots per game – 1.76 points per shot.
Also helping Ole Miss is LSU’s defensive strategy. The Tigers have played zone for 3.1 percent of their defensive possessions, second lowest in the SEC. Ole Miss has played the most zone in the SEC at 32.2 percent.
The lineup will be in flux for Ole Miss as they take on LSU. Kennedy is looking for better minutes from his frontcourt, and as a result could be leaning on younger players more.
“We’re going to continue to mix and match and see who is the best for that particular matchup, as well as who is performing the best,” Kennedy said of his frontcourt. “At the end of the day, we’re all in a production business.”
Kennedy said Henderson will start against LSU. With Jarvis Summers having a career-best season, it is safe to assume he’ll remain in the starting lineup, but everything else is up in the air.
Graphic By Tyler Bischoff | The Daily Mississippian
But Kennedy isn’t the only coaching playing with his rotation. After a beatdown at home at the hands of Tennessee, LSU head coach Johnny Jones shook up their starting lineup. Malik Morgan and Shavon Coleman were inserted in the starting lineup over Andre Stringer and Jarell Martin.
Morgan and Coleman responded by scoring the first nine LSU points against South Carolina. Off the bench, Martin came away with his best game, scoring 18 points.
Martin has the potential to exploit Ole Miss’ weakness of defending big men that can shoot, Martin is six-foot-nine and has made 39 percent of his 1.9 threes per game.
LSU has a roster full of height. Four of their top nine players are six-foot-eight or taller, and two more are over six-foot-five. (They do have two guards under six feet, however.) That size puts LSU second in the SEC at 40.6 rebounds per game, and third with 13.93 offensive boards per game.
They are only seventh in the conference in rebounding percentage, grabbing 52.5 percent of rebounds. Ole Miss is 13th, collecting 48.5 percent.
Two Tigers are in the top 10 of the SEC in rebounding; Johnny O’Bryant III and Jordan Mickey grab over seven rebounds per game. But both players are outside of the top 20 in rebounding percentage.
Their size could make it difficult for Kennedy to play the tall but skinny Anthony Perez in the post, as he did against Mississippi State.
Mickey is blocking 3.4 shots per game, second in the conference. Junior forward Aaron Jones is third with 2.6 blocks per game.
Ole Miss leads the SEC with seven blocked shots per game, LSU is third at 6.3. Both teams are having their own shots blocked less than four times per game.
O’Bryant will be tough enough for the inexperienced front court of Ole Miss to defend. However, when LSU decides to play their biggest lineup – Martin, Mickey and O’Bryant all on the floor together, Ole Miss could face a major matchup problem. All three players are over six-foot-eight, and it could lead to a guard under six-foot-four defending a big man.
But Ole Miss will likely play a lot of zone against an ultra-big lineup. And a potential saving grace for the Rebels is that two the Tigers top guards are under six feet.
“They’re probably as long and as athletic as any group that we’ll face all season along their front line,” Kennedy said.
The game starts at 8 p.m. and will be televised on CSS.
For continuing coverage of Ole Miss men’s basketball, follow @Tyler_RSR and @thedm_sports on Twitter.
— Tyler Bischoff
tfbischo@go.olemiss.edu
