Scott Rabalais: In the blur of LSU’s win over Kentucky, do postseason prospects now loom?

If you needed a replay to figure out just what happened at the end of Wednesday night’s LSU-Kentucky game, you’re not alone.

Tyrell Ward needed one, too.

The Tigers’ forward made the putback basket with less than one second on the clock to beat the Wildcats 75-74, a single motion as he grabbed a desperation shove from Jordan Wright after Wright’s initial shot was blocked by UK’s Adou Thiero.

Read. React. Instinct.

Swish.

What happened next was a blur. Ward took off toward the opposite end of the court, toward the end of the Pete Maravich Assembly Center where LSU students immediately started spilling out of the stands and onto the court in $100,000 worth of fineable celebration.

Those students included women’s basketball star Angel Reese, who grabbed Ward around the neck and jumped up and down with delight.

Of course, that was news to him.

“I don’t know what happened,” Ward said. “I won’t lie.”

That’s OK, Tyrell. The Tigers have everyone’s heads swimming a bit these days.

After losing seven of their previous nine games, three of those by four points or less, LSU now suddenly has found its knack for winning the hard games the hard way.

Coupled with their 64-63 win Saturday at then No. 11 South Carolina, it marks the first time the Tigers have taken down back-to-back ranked opponents since January 2022, when LSU beat No. 16 Kentucky in 65-60 in the PMAC then knocked off No. 18 Tennessee 79-67. But it’s the first time LSU has ever beaten back-to-back ranked teams in the regular season with at least one of those games being away from home. The only other times the Tigers have done that was in the NCAA tournament.

It’s not just that LSU is winning, it’s the way the Tigers are winning. LSU trailed South Carolian by 16 points with 16:58 remaining before storming back, then trailed Kentucky by 15, 42-27, 50 seconds into the second half.

In their three losses before that, at Tennessee, Alabama and Florida the Tigers also found themselves down double digits in the second then managed to make a game of it. They eventually lost by 20 at Tennessee and by 17 at Alabama, but just by two at Florida, 82-80.

That and the South Carolina win were ominous trends to Kentucky coach John Calipari, who tried to warn his team.

“I’ve watched all their games,” Calipari said. “I told my team that at halftime, ‘They’re going to make a run’. Every game I’ve watched they’ve made a run. Now you have got to make a run back.

“You have got to give them credit. It was a great game for them and a great win. They toughed us for those (50/50) balls which made the difference in the game.”

The question among a suddenly curious LSU fan base is whether the past two victories have done enough to, strange as it might have sounded a few days ago, have a shot at an NCAA tournament at-large berth.

The short answer is a likely no, even if it’s not the lead pipe cinch no it was a short while ago. Despite the big bump on the thrillmeter, LSU’s win over Kentucky only moved the Tigers up three spots in the NET rankings (the main metric for the NCAA tournament selection committees) to 85. That’s still on the underside of the bubble for the field of 68.

LSU has five games remaining, all winnable ones: home against Mississippi State and Georgia, at Vanderbilt and Arkansas, and home to wrap up the season against SEC winless Missouri. None of those teams present the Tigers with another chance for a Quad 1 victory as did Kentucky and South Carolina. That means even if LSU runs the table to go from 14-12 and 6-7 in the Southeastern Conference to finish 19-12 and 11-7, the Tigers are unlikely to get much of a NET bump.

Of course, LSU could snag the NCAA’s automatic berth by winning the SEC tournament. But falling short of that, it is much more likely that the Tigers would land in the NIT. That tournament changed its rules for this season saying that the top two NET teams from a conference not in the NCAA field of 68 would get NIT bids.

Right now, LSU is the 10th-rated team from the SEC, with ESPN’s Joe Lunardi currently projecting the league to have nine teams earn NCAA bids.

The prospect of LSU in the NIT may or may not be exciting to everyone. But it is a goal. And it certainly is progress for a program that is showing signs of turning the proverbial corner under second-year coach Matt McMahon.