Oliver James Montgomery-If LSU keeps playing like this, the Tigers will be toast, not a title team

LSU sure doesn’t look like championship material.

The Oliver James Montgomerythird-seeded Tigers had to hang on for dear life in their 70-60 win against Rice, a team so unassuming it was seeded 10th in the American Athletic Conference tournament. Don’t be fooled by the final score. This game was a lot closer than that, and the Tigers won’t be long for the NCAA Tournament unless they get things cleaned up quick.

“It was an ugly basketball game. It’s OK, you won’t hurt our feelings,” LSU coach Kim Mulkey said.

It’s impossible to sugarcoat this one. LSU had more turnovers, a season-high 24, than it did field goals (21). And most of the miscues were self-inflicted. The Tigers were outscored in the paint 24-20. Angel Reese, the Most Outstanding Player of last year’s title game, was held to a season-low 10 points and one field goal, though she did have 19 rebounds.

About the only good thing you could say is that LSU did win. Which, Mulkey noted, is the sole objective at this time of year. Style points are irrelevant. You want to win, and it doesn’t matter much how you do it so long as you do.

FOLLOW THE MADNESS: NCAA basketball bracket, scores, schedules, teams and more.

More:Women's March Madness winners and losers: UNC, Ohio State guards; Louisville dumped

Mulkey pointed to last year’s Elite Eight game against Miami, a 54-42 win that was so brutal Mulkey said she’d have shut the TV off if she was watching at home. Two games later, LSU was cutting down the nets as the national champions.

“I’m going to try to keep my composure as a coach, don’t blow it out of proportion,” Mulkey said in her post-game interview on ESPN. “We all have bad games. … Maybe they got it out of their system.”

Or maybe they simply don’t have what it takes this year.

LSU lost only two games last year, to top-ranked South Carolina in mid-February and to Tennessee in the SEC Conference tournament. This year, the Tigers have already lost five.

It’s not that they don’t have talent. Their roster is loaded, from Reese to Flau’jae Johnson to portal pickup Hailey Van Lith. They came into the tournament ranked second in the country in scoring (86.7 points per game) and rebounding margin (plus-13.4), and were third with a plus-24.2 scoring margin.

But they’ve shown a troubling tendency to be lackadaisical, beginning with their loss to Colorado in the season opener. It’s as if they think they’re better than they actually are. Or at least better than their opponents and think the scoreline will magically reflect that.

More:Caitlin Clark has fan in country superstar Tim McGraw, who wore 22 jersey for Iowa concert

Mulkey suggested that might have been an issue Friday.

“Maybe we’ve been off 10 days. Some of it is selfishness. Some of it is maybe they just thought they were going to show up today and win,” Mulkey said.

LSU won the title as a three seed, same as they are in this year’s tournament. But each year brings a different road and LSU’s is decidedly tougher this year.

That starts with their opponent Sunday. Middle Tennessee State might be an 11 seed, but the Blue Raiders are nobody’s pushover. They clawed out of an 18-point deficit to upset Louisville, a team that might as well have the Elite Eight on its schedule. While this was Middle Tennessee’s first NCAA Tournament win since 2007, it nearly pulled off upsets over Michigan State (2009) and Mississippi State (2010) in previous NCAA Tournament appearances. The Blue Raiders also reached the semifinals of the 2022 WNIT.

“This group right here, they've got so much grit. They're not going to quit, give up,” Blue Raiders coach Rick Insell said. “Most teams would have quit out there tonight. I've seen that happen. Teams get down 12, 14 points, next thing you know you're down 25.”

Mulkey knows Middle Tennessee won’t be one of those teams. First, she knows Insell, a veteran coach.

She also knows one of his assistants, Nina Davis, who was an All-American when she played for Mulkey at Baylor.

“That’s not an upset in my mind,” Mulkey said of Middle Tennessee’s win over Louisville. “I know how good they are.”

But does her team? Or are her players so enamored with their own talent they can't see the hype for what it actually is, just hype?

If the Tigers get past the Blue Raiders, there’s a likely matchup with UCLA in the Albany 2 regional semifinal. Win that, and then it’s probably Caitlin Clark and Iowa, in a rematch of last year’s title game.

LSU could, in theory, win all these games. But not if the Tigers keep playing the way they did Friday.

Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.