University of Houston Athletics
Cougars Fall To LSU, 80-51
1/8/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Jan 8, 2003
BATON ROUGE, La. - Ronald Dupree scored 23 points and helped LSU shake off a sloppy first half for an 80-51 victory over Houston Wednesday night.
Looking to shake off the 89-63 loss at Georgia, the Tigers came into the game with a 44-game non-conference regular season home winning streak on the line.
LSU (10-2) jumped out to a 17-9 lead before seniors Louis Truscott and Jeremee McGuire led a Cougar rally that closed the gap to 21-19 with 3:42 remaining in the first half. That was as close as Houston would get as LSU closed out the half with a 16-3 run to take a 37-22 lead into halftime.
The Tigers quickly picked right up where they left off as LSU opened the second half outscoring the Cougars 13-4 to extend their lead to 22 points (48-26) with 16:04 left to play.
Houston (2-9) couldn't recover and LSU extended its lead to 73-39 with 4:37 left to play.
LSU cleared its bench with 2:07 remaining and the Tigers went on to win 80-51.
The Cougars shot just 36 percent from the field, including 29 percent beyond the three-point arc. Houston made just four three pointers throughout the game with two coming in the final minute by reserver walk-on Kevin Barker.
Louis Truscott was the only Houston player to score in double figures as he ended the game with 12 points despite taking just four shots from the field. He also pulled down a game-high 15 rebounds as Houston out-rebounded the Tigers, 38-27.
LSU, which returns to Southeastern Conference play on Saturday against Mississippi State, had 14 steals, 3 blocked shots and forced the Cougars into 28 turnovers.
The Tigers also had four players score in double figures. In addition to Dupree's 23 pints, Collis Temple the III netted 14 points, Torris Bright had 11 points and 10 assists and Antonio Hudson tallied 10 points.
The Cougars open their Conference USA schedule this Saturday when Houston plays host to UAB at 7:30 p.m. in Hofheinz Pavilion. UH also plays Saint Louis in a C-USA home game on January 18 at 1:00 p.m.
