BATON ROUGE – Texas A&M isn't leading Division I in scoring defense for no reason.

The Aggies built a few runs off of its stingy defense to either briefly take the lead – which was early – or cut LSU women's basketball advantage down to with a couple of possession like in the third quarter.

Kim Mulkey and her bunch, who sports the nation's highest scoring offense, countered with a heavy dose of Angel Reese as the Tigers stood firm out of those A&M runs to pull away, 87-70, inside the Pete Maravich Assembly Center Thursday night.

Reese finished with a double-double of 20 points and 18 rebounds to lead LSU (16-1, 3-0) to its third straight Southeastern Conference victory.

Angel Reese involved in gameplan early, often for LSU women's basketball

Because of all of the weapons LSU has, the ball has been spread around plenty through the first 16 games this season.

But Kim Mulkey and her staff saw an opportunity on film to feed star forward Angel Reese the ball inside early and often against Texas A&M's Janiah Barker and Lauren Ware. Angel Reese got seven of the first 12 touches in scoring position for LSU to open the game, recording 10 of the team's first 22 points of the game.

And Reese rewarded her team by nearly recording a double-double in the first 10 minutes at 10 points and seven rebounds. She got her double-double halfway through the second quarter.

Kim Mulkey's squad puts on a passing clinic

The Aggies cut LSU's lead to 44-39 early in the third quarter. The next possession, Reese brought the ball up the floor, handed it off to Hailey Van Lith before she passed it back to Reese who found a streaking Aneesah Morrow across the lane for a backdoor layup.

There were several instances of great passes that LSU completed against Texas A&M's vaunted defense, passes it was going to have to make the keep the pressure on. And the Tigers turned in one of its better collective passing displays.

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Reese had a team-high seven assists while three other players and six total players had at least one assist for a team total of 18.

Texas A&M exploits Tigers transition defense to keep things respectable early

In the first half, LSU had every opportunity to stretch the game out. But led by guard Endyia Rogers, the Aggies made an adjustment to push the ball up the floor off LSU misses, which were more than there should've been as the Tigers went 16-of-32 on layups.

Rogers led Texas A&M in scoring with 19 points by orchestrating the fastbreak, where A&M scored 15 points. Her efforts allowed her team to linger well in the second half. The Aggies outscored the Tigers in the paint, 34 to 24.

Cory Diaz covers the LSU Tigers and Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns for The Daily Advertiser as part of the USA TODAY Network. Follow his Tigers and Cajuns coverage on Twitter: @ByCoryDiaz. Got questions regarding LSU/UL athletics? Send them to Cory Diaz at bdiaz@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: Angel Reese leads LSU women's basketball past Texas A&M