Auburn loses out on five-star recruit to in-conference school

Bruce Pearl won’t be adding another five-star to his squad just yet.

Any hopes of the Tigers adding another five-star to its recruiting class will have to wait.

Five-star small forward Julian Phillips, who was seemingly warm on Auburn in recent weeks before his commitment on Thursday, has decided to play for the in-conference Tennessee Volunteers. Phillips is the Volunteers’ only hard commit of Tennessee’s class thus far.

Philips, like new Auburn commit Yohan Traore, was slated to go to LSU before head coach Will Wade’s departure led to him de-committing. Traore chose Auburn as his destination, but Philips decided not to follow his teammate and to head to Knoxville, Tennessee to play for the Volunteers instead.

Philips would have gone to an SEC champion either way — Auburn clinched the regular-season SEC title last year, but the Volunteers were the winners of 2022’s SEC tournament. The Tigers played Tennessee once last year for the Big 12/SEC Challenge, where they lost 67-62 in Knoxville.

The addition of Phillips could make Tennessee a stronger force to be reckoned with in the SEC, a probability that Bruce Pearl and his squad are likely not too pleased with. Nevertheless, Auburn’s 2022 recruiting class is still currently No. 16 on 247Sports’ recruiting class rankings, and the Tigers look to repeat their success from last year with Traore and new transfer [autotag]Johni Broome[/autotag].

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