By james art 
Against Tennessee, Kailin Gilbert is a force to comply with.
“They picked up the phone too late into the portal,” Gilbert said. “So I was kind of upset by it.”
Gilbert entered the transfer portal after being cut off from the Arizona list last spring. Now the LSU Tiger, Gilbert uses the lack of Vols initiative as a motivator.
“I’m glad they were late,” Blvish said.
Flau’jae Johnson, Mikaylah Williams and Aneesah Morow took the back seat at the LSU win 82-77 over Tennessee. Instead, when Tennessee was in his best position, Gilbert turned to the driver’s seat. It finished with 23 points, shooting 7 to 15 of the pitch and 3-from-4 of three.
“We hope this is the beginning of something,” Gilbert said.
This was not Gilbert’s first time to have a decisive impact against Tennessee. The last time the two programs were confronted, Gilbert sank a contested hook to give LSU a victory 89-87 when the clock approached zero.
“She does a good job by finding her photos,” said Tennessee’s head coach Kim Caldwell. “She makes big plays, she’s a good player.”
Although her contribution did not have the thrill she made on January 9, she was certainly necessary in the same way.
Michael Williams finished with 16 points, shooting 6 to 15 of the pitch and 2 out of 7 of three. But her intention was obvious to include others like Gilbert, adding seven assists to her presentation.
However, Johnson has four fouls and Morow with three was not part of the plan. In addition, Williams fouled the game with 11 seconds left in the game. Johnson finished with 12 points and Morow added 14 points and 14 rebounds.
Gilbert helped fill this gap, but she didn’t do it alone.
Mjracle Sheppard added eight points along with five rebounds, and real freshman Jada Richard added five more points.
“The lightweight coach emphasizes the impact, like what you can do to produce what you can do on the court,” Shepard said. “My first instinct is to do something.”
The LSU leaned against its “Big Troika” throughout the season and would just see sparks from a rotation of three to four other players. So when it came to depth, Tennessee had a great advantage as he managed to turn five new players in and out at once.
But the presence of depth is only important whether it is effective. Unfortunately for Tennessee, he struck 19 rpm and LSU turned these speeds into 24 additional points.
On the other hand, LSU turned the ball over 13 times and overtook the volunteers 41-37.
“We were not affected at least of their press and their rotation of the players,” Blvish said.
Tennessee made his largest move in the third quarter, leading with four points.
Taleysia Cooper led this charge with 12 points from the third quarter and finished with 16 points. Ruby Whitehorn led Tennessee with 21 points, firing 9 out of 20 of the pitch and 1 in 4 out of three.
Jewel Spear scored 19 for Vols, and Zee Spearman added 15 points and six rebounds.
But when Tennessee came to life in the third quarter, Gilbert replied with 15 points of his own.
Once again, LSU was triggered and once again LSU won a big victory.
Just three days before, Tennessee upset the No. 4 Connecticut 80-76. After winning this scale, there may not have been a team in the country with more inertia than the volunteers.
But LSU has found a way to stop this inertia and take it in the challenge to come.
On Sunday, the tigers will travel to Austin to take the Longhorm in Texas, who get out of a great victory.
Longhorns removed South Carolina 66-62, giving Gamecocks its second loss of the season.
Now the bets are so much more, as LSU has the chance to give Texas its second loss to the season conference, and Texas has a chance to remain Frontrunner on SEC.
LSU will give up Texas on Sunday from 2pm from the center of Moody.