LSU beats Hartford 60-39 in 1st round

DURHAM, N.C. (AP) - Only minutes into the game, LSU was on its way to another NCAA tournament opening-round victory.

LaSondra Barrett scored 20 points to help LSU beat Hartford 60-39 on Saturday in the first round of the NCAA women's tournament.

Courtney Jones and Allison Hightower each added 10 for the Tigers (21-9), the No. 7 seed in the Memphis Regional. LSU went on an early 17-0 run and was never seriously challenged from there, marking the 12th straight year that the Tigers have won at least one tournament game.

LSU advanced to the second round to play the Hampton-Duke winner on Monday night.

Diana Delva scored 12 points for the 10th-seeded Hawks (27-5), who ended the season with back-to-back losses after running off 20 straight victories. Hartford was coming off a loss to Vermont in the America East Conference tournament final, yet it earned its first at-large berth to the tournament.

Things got so bad Saturday for Hartford that coach Jennifer Rizzotti was ejected after picking up her second technical foul with 7:27 to play and her team down 52-29.

LSU came into the tournament with one of the nation's stingiest scoring defenses at 52 points per game. But it quickly became clear that the Tigers were going to improve on those numbers against Hartford, which had a 4-0 lead only to go scoreless for nearly 8 minutes as the Tigers took control.

Katherine Graham's layup capped the run for the 17-4 lead with 12:05 left in the opening half, a margin that would grow to 16 points late in the half.

Hartford, meanwhile, avoided its lowest-scoring first half (14 points) of the season only when Nikkia Smith hit a jumper to beat the shot clock with about 15 seconds left and cut the deficit to 29-15 at the break. That ended a half in which the Hawks had three shot-clock violations and had to force up shots several other times to beat the clock, prompting an exasperated Rizzotti to at one point scream "Shoot it!" to her players from the bench.

The Hawks got as close as 13 on a four-point play from Ilicia Mathis early in the second half, but the Tigers responded with 13 straight points — starting with consecutive three-point plays from Barrett and Jones — to push the lead back up to 47-21 and seal the win.

A few minutes later, Rizzotti — frustrated with the officiating the entire afternoon — picked up her second technical and gave a thumbs-up to the officials as she walked off the court.