By GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
TALLAHASSEE, Florida – Coach Will Wade and the LSU men’s basketball team with its very large available roster of 13 players will play its final exhibition game on Saturday at Florida State (12 p.m., ACCNX TV) at the Donald L. Tucker Civic Center.
With the LSU football team kicking off at 11 a.m. at Auburn on ABC and on the LSU Radio Network, there will be no radio coverage of the game by LSU.
LSU released a 14-man roster last Wednesday on its athletics website, lsusports.net, after listing only four through much of October. The Tigers enjoyed what amounted to a National Signing Day last Tuesday when news broke that three of Wade’s top signees for the 2026-27 season had finally been cleared by the NCAA.
That trio features 22-year-old junior forward Saliou Niang (6-foot-6, 190), formerly of the Virtus pro team in Bologna, Italy, 23-year-old senior center Brice Dessert (6-11, 247), formerly of the Andalou Efes pro team in Istanbul, Turkey, and 23-year-old fifth-year senior shooting guard Skyy Clark (6-3, 210), formerly of UCLA. All three could be starters this afternoon or when the Tigers open the regular season on Tuesday, Nov. 3, against LSU-New Orleans at 7 p.m. in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
But a 14th player was mistakenly released by LSU on that website roster, as only 13 have been cleared by the NCAA as of Saturday, according to a Tiger Rag source. The non-cleared player is 7-foot-3, 242-pound center Gilad Levy, a 24-year-old projected senior from the Palencia pro team in Spain.
Levy has not been cleared because of his age, according to the NCAA’s new age-based rule passed last June that allows college athletes to play five seasons over five years instead of four years.
The five-year clock for overseas pro players who have never been to college, like Levy, begins with the first full-time semester after they turn 19. Levy turned 19 on July 3, 2021, so his clock at LSU, or another school, began with the 2021-22 season. His five-season window, therefore, ended when the 2025-26 season ended. LSU is trying to get an exception to that rule from the NCAA.
While Niang, Dessert and Levy have never played college basketball, their college class designations are determined by their age. At 23, Dessert is considered a senior with his clock at LSU starting in the 2022-23 season. At 22, Niang is considered a junior with his clock starting in 2023-24.
LSU won its exhibition opener, 63-60, at McNeese State on Oct. 8 when Wade used only seven of his available 10 players, and it beat Central Florida, 85-81, on Oct. 14 at home with just six of its then-available 10 players.
Through the two exhibition games, senior UCLA transfer point guard Donovan Dent, senior Kansas State transfer guard Abdi Bashir Jr., and senior Kentucky transfer forward Mo Dioubate are all close in scoring. Dent is averaging 16.5 points with Bashir and Dioubate at 15.5 a game each. Dent just missed a triple double in the last-minute win over the Knights with 21 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds. Bashir had 28 in that game, hitting six three-pointers.
Freshman center Michael Ruzic, a 19-year-old transfer from the Joventut pro team in Catalonia, Spain, has impressed in the first two contests averaging 13 points and 14.5 rebounds with double doubles in each game.
The Seminoles have played one exhibition game against Auburn on Oct. 14, an 82-71 win in Birmingham at Boutwell Arena.
Season tickets and single game non-conference tickets remain on sale at the LSU ticket office and online at LSUTix.net for this season. Mini-plans, which include Southeastern Conference games, are also on sale.
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