Tag: auburn tigers basketball

Auburn smacks Washington in battle of familiar USC foes

#USC defeated Auburn on Sunday. Auburn beat Washington by 23 on Wednesday. USC faces Washington in one week. A lot of game film will be studied.

The Auburn Tigers lost their second game of the season on Sunday at the hands of the USC Trojans in a statement win for Andy Enfield’s team.

Then, USC defeated Colorado State on Wednesday night to finish the nonconference slate.

In a notable plot twist, the next opponent for USC is Washington — the team that Auburn just crushed, 84-61, on Wednesday night in Seattle.

At the end of the first half, Auburn had an eight-point lead, but the second half was much different. Bruce Pearl’s team scored 53 points and outscored the Huskies by 15 in the final 20 minutes to get the victory and bounce back after a tough loss on Sunday.

Auburn learned from its game against USC when it played Washington. USC will now study Auburn-Washington game tape to prepare for the Huskies on Dec. 30 in Seattle. Washington will be studying USC-Auburn tape to gear up for the Trojans. It will be interesting to see how the Trojans and Huskies perform against each other, since they just played the same common opponent over the past four days.

Jaylin Williams and Johni Broome each had 18 points to lead Auburn against Washington. The Huskies dropped just their fourth game of the year and first since losing to Gonzaga.

Senior guard and Kentucky transfer Keion Brooks Jr. led the way for Washington, finishing with 15 points and five rebounds on 5-15 from the field. The only other Husky in double figures was Koren Johnson (12 points) in a tough night.

Washington shot just 36.8 percent from the field and 25 percent from downtown in a rough night offensively, and things won’t get easier against a gritty USC team.

The Huskies and Trojans won’t face each other until December 30, but the fact that USC just defeated Auburn, and Auburn beat Washington by over 20, is encouraging news for Andy Enfield and his group.

Now the Trojans need to pounce when they go to Seattle in a crucial Pac-12 road trip.

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Auburn star Wendell Green Jr. dealing with ankle injury ahead of USC tilt

#Auburn Tigers star Wendell Green Jr. has an ankle injury and might not play against USC on Sunday.

The USC Trojans are preparing for a massive game against the Auburn Tigers on Sunday afternoon in the Galen Center.

The Trojans defeated Long Beach State on Wednesday, and the Tigers beat Georgia State in each team’s final game before the showdown.

However, Bruce Pearl’s team just got some unfortunate news regarding its star player, Wendell Green Jr.

According to Adam Cole of Opelika-Auburn News, Green turned his ankle and might not be available for Sunday’s game. Green is the team’s leading scorer (13.8 PPG) and is one of three Auburn players averaging in double figures.

If Green is out, that would be a huge loss … and a much better chance for the Trojans to get the victory.

Freshman Tre Donaldson would seemingly get more run if Green can’t go, although he has played sparingly so far this season.

In the Georgia State game, Donaldson played a season-high 19 minutes and scored six points for Auburn.

The Trojans have played much better as of late and have won four straight, and Andy Enfield likes where the team is headed.

With or without Green, Auburn will be a tough matchup for the Trojans. If Green isn’t out, however, things look much better as USC hopes to get a top-25 victory under its belt before the Trojans head into Pac-12 play.

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Looking at Auburn basketball: recent loss to Memphis offers a path to victory for USC

The USC Trojans face Auburn this Sunday afternoon. The Tigers recently lost their first game of the year when they fell to Memphis, Boogie Ellis’ former team.

When the USC Trojans’ 2022-2023 basketball schedule came out, the game against Auburn was the biggest one on the nonconference slate.

This Sunday afternoon, the Tigers and Trojans will face off in a terrific matchup at the Galen Center.

Auburn has just one loss this season, and it was a nine-point defeat against Memphis in a Tiger-Tiger showdown.

Auburn trailed at the half by six, and it couldn’t get back on track in the second half. It was an uncharacteristic outing for Auburn, and this was the first time all season long that Bruce Pearl’s team allowed more than 80 points in a contest. In fact, it was the only time all season when any AU opponent scored more than 72 points, so the Auburn defense has been the calling card so far this season, as it usually is for a Bruce Pearl-coached team. Auburn relies on its defensive pressure to throw opponents off balance. Auburn offenses specifically and Pearl offenses generally will go through lulls, often when relying too much on the 3-point shot, but the defense is the anchor which stabilizes Pearl’s teams. Auburn can stay in games at the defensive end of the floor when it isn’t functioning well on offense.

Auburn’s leading scorer Wendell Green Jr, did his part once again, finishing with 14 points and five assists in the loss. But, they shot 38.1% from the field and just 25% from downtown, and the defense couldn’t contain Memphis.

Memphis star Kendric Davis went off, dropping 27 points with nine rebounds and six assists on 9-19 from the field. Drew Peterson and Boogie Ellis will try to attain those numbers, but if they can’t, Reese Dixon-Waters will try to pick up the slack.

Against the Trojans, Auburn’s defense should think it can perform well: USC averages under 70 points per game. The worry for Auburn: USC also thrives on defense. It should be an old-school battle between two defenses which will try to be at the top of their game on Sunday afternoon in the Galen Center.

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Auburn holds off Georgia State in final game before facing USC this Sunday

The #Auburn Tigers won their final tune-up game before facing the #USC Trojans Sunday afternoon at the Galen Center.

The USC Trojans and Auburn Tigers face off in a massive showdown on Sunday afternoon at the Galen Center.

Bruce Pearl against Andy Enfield in a matchup of two NCAA Tournament teams. The Trojans beat Long Beach State to win their fourth straight game on Wednesday night, and Auburn defeated Georgia State, 72-64, to get back on track after falling to Memphis this past weekend.

Senior forward Jaylin Williams shined for Auburn, finishing with a game-high (and a season-high for him) 20 points with eight rebounds as three Tigers finished in double figures.

The Auburn defense — its calling card — showed up and held Georgia State to 37.9-percent shooting from the field and just 29.4 percent from downtown.

Auburn’s defense was not especially strong against Memphis, at least not when Memphis was able to get off a shot attempt. Auburn did force a lot of Memphis turnovers, but it allowed Memphis to hit 50 percent of its field goal attempts. Bruce Pearl surely hated that.

Auburn made real defensive improvements against Georgia State.

Auburn now heads west and faces USC and then Washington in a tough Pac-12 trip, but the Trojan game is the toughest one on the nonconference slate for both teams.

Surprisingly enough — and somewhat encouraging for USC — is that Auburn trailed GSU by three at the half, 31-28, before scoring 44 in the second half.

Auburn’s leading scorer, Wendell Green Jr., finished with 17 points on 3-9 from the field, but he went 11-15 from the free throw line as Georgia State had one player foul out and two others record four fouls.

The Auburn defense might give the Trojans fits on Sunday, but after Reese Dixon-Waters and Tre White scored career-highs with 20 points each, the Tigers could be in trouble.

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Oklahoma Sooners bounce back with pivotal 72-62 win over West Virginia Mountaineer

The Oklahoma Sooners ended their four-game losing streak by beating West Virginia 72-62. Tanner Groves led the way with 21 points.

Coming into the pivotal road matchup with the West Virginia Mountaineers, the Oklahoma Sooners were desperate for a win. Losers of four straight, Porter Moser and crew needed to shake things up to get an edge heading into Morgantown.

The shakeup came in a lineup change that saw Jacob Groves join brother Tanner in the starting lineup in favor of Elijah Harkless, who’d been a starter for the Oklahoma Sooners for much of the last two seasons. For at least one game, the change helped spark the Sooners to a big 72-62 road win over the West Virginia Mountaineers.

Tanner Groves led the way with 21 points on 9 of 11 shooting and added six rebounds as well. Jacob Groves rewarded Porter Moser’s faith with 12 points and four rebounds. He shot 4 of 6 from the field, including 2 of 4 from three-point range. Umoja Gibson also added 12 points and five steals in the win.

On the night, Oklahoma shot 51% from the field and 35% from three-point range. They were 21 of 22 from the free throw line.

On the evening, Oklahoma continued their careless way with the basketball, with 17 turnovers, but because they were hitting their shots it didn’t seem to matter as much. Of course, it helps that they forced 15 West Virginia turnovers to keep the Mountaineers’ offense from ever really threatening for much of this game.

The last time the game was tied was with 12 minutes left in the first half. Once Oklahoma went up 14-12, they went up for good. A 15-4 run in the first gave the Sooners an 11-point lead and Tanner Groves’ three-pointer at the buzzer gave Oklahoma an eight-point lead going into halftime.

The Sooners opened it up to a 17-point lead midway through the second half and six points with about a minute remaining was as close as the Mountaineers would get to making a comeback.

With the win, the Oklahoma Sooners improve to 13-7 and 3-5 in the Big 12 ahead of a critical matchup with the No. 1 team in the country the Auburn Tigers. The Sooners and Tigers tip off at 12:00 p.m. central on ESPN.

West Virginia falls to 13-6 and 2-5 in the Big 12 and will next face Arkansas. Both games are a part of the Big 12-SEC challenge.

Contact/Follow us @SoonersWire on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Oklahoma news, notes, and opinions. Let us know your thoughts, comment on this story below. Join the conversation today.

Auburn basketball lands in top half of The Athletic’s early SEC power rankings

Auburn basketball comes in the middle of the pack of The Athletic’s early SEC power rankings for the 2021-22 season.

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After a down year that saw star players have both eligibility issues and injuries, Auburn is expected to be back as a major SEC title and NCAA Tournament contender in 2021-22.

While the squad will look brand new due to departures, both incoming and outgoing transfers and the arrival of the highest-rated signee in program history, the Tigers are bound to be both talented and deep with a lot of skill players coming off the bench.

The Athletic released its early SEC power rankings for next season and has Auburn in the sixth place.

Here’s what the publication has to say:

Bruce Pearl really had it rolling: SEC title in 2018, Final Four in 2019, unprecedented third straight 25-win season in 2020. Then came COVID and all the weird stuff last season brought with it, and the Tigers fell off a cliff. Five-star freshman Sharife Cooper only played a dozen (albeit dazzling) games and rookie sharpshooter Justin Powell only got in 10 before a concussion shut him down for good. Auburn was never really whole or clicked, and went 13-14 and finished 10th in the league. But there’s a very good chance that was an anomaly. Even losing Cooper and JT Thor to the NBA Draft, Powell to Tennessee and part-time starter Jamal Johnson to UAB, the Tigers look well-equipped to challenge the best teams in the SEC again.

Three starters returned: Flanigan (14.3 ppg, 5.5 rpg), Cambridge (8.9 ppg, 3.6 rpg) and Williams (10.9 ppg, 4.7 rpg). Two five-star big men were added: McDonald’s All-American Jabari Smith, who is top-five in the Class of 2021 and the highest-rated recruit to pick Auburn in the history of 247Sports, and 7-foot-1 North Carolina transfer Walker Kessler. Three backcourt transfers round it out: Green, an All-OVC point guard who averaged 15.8 points and 5.0 assists at Eastern Kentucky; Jasper, an All-CAA shooting guard who averaged 15.6 points and made 37 percent of his career 3-pointers at College of Charleston; and K.D. Johnson, a former top-100 recruit who averaged 13.5 points and made 39 percent of his 3s as a freshman at Georgia. That’s more than enough for a Pearl-coached team with a normal offseason and typical schedule to get back on track.

Here’s how the rest of the SEC rankings go down:

1. Kentucky

2. Tennessee

3. Arkansas

4. Mississippi State

5. Alabama

6. Auburn

7. LSU

8. Ole Miss

9. Florida

10. Texas A&M

11. Missouri

12. South Carolina

13. Georgia

14. Vanderbilt

Auburn, Bruce Pearl watching NBA to learn how to use size on court

Bruce Pearl has the tallest roster since arriving at Auburn and is learning how to use all of that size by watching the Los Angeles Lakers.

For the first time since Bruce Pearl arrived at Auburn in 2014, he’s going to have a good problem on the court in a lot of size.

With UNC transfer Walker Kessler (7-foot-1), J.T. Thor (6-foot-10), Babatunde Akingbola (6-foot-10) and Dylan Cardwell (6-foot-11), the Tigers now have four players, counting Thor, that can be mismatches in the interior. Yet how will Pearl and his staff keep everyone happy with playing time and get the most out of their skills? The Auburn coach is learning by watching the reigning NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers.

“Everybody knows that they’re better when the big fella (Davis) plays the 5 and LeBron plays the 4,” Pearl said per AuburnSports.com Bryan Matthews. “Well, they’ve got a couple of centers that need to be out there. All of a sudden, they’re all playing out of position. They’re bigger. What could they be doing better?

“I watch the Lakers really carefully, because we’re probably going to be bigger. So, taking advantage of our size and it not being a weakness. Letting it be a strength and a problem for our opponents.”

The arrival of Kessler, a former five-star recruit, is one of the top gets in all of college basketball this offseason as he brings a versatility to the position that Auburn hasn’t had in the past.

When you add in Jaylin Williams (6-foot-8) and incoming freshman Jabari Smith Jr. (6-foot-9), you also have three big guys that can shoot from the outside.

“I think the thing is, you look at every team and look at what we have. We’re gonna be really big at 4 and 5, bigger than we’ve ever been,” Pearl said. “We’ve got really skilled guys at the position. Dylan is really getting skilled. He’s really mobile. Walker is really mobile. Stretch is really mobile. Jaylin and Jabari are really skilled. I’ve got five really good frontline guys. So that’s going to be different.”

Auburn, Bruce Pearl watching NBA to learn how to use size on court

Bruce Pearl has the tallest roster since arriving at Auburn and is learning how to use all of that size by watching the Los Angeles Lakers.

For the first time since Bruce Pearl arrived at Auburn in 2014, he’s going to have a good problem on the court in a lot of size.

With UNC transfer Walker Kessler (7-foot-1), J.T. Thor (6-foot-10), Babatunde Akingbola (6-foot-10) and Dylan Cardwell (6-foot-11), the Tigers now have four players, counting Thor, that can be mismatches in the interior. Yet how will Pearl and his staff keep everyone happy with playing time and get the most out of their skills? The Auburn coach is learning by watching the reigning NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers.

“Everybody knows that they’re better when the big fella (Davis) plays the 5 and LeBron plays the 4,” Pearl said per AuburnSports.com Bryan Matthews. “Well, they’ve got a couple of centers that need to be out there. All of a sudden, they’re all playing out of position. They’re bigger. What could they be doing better?

“I watch the Lakers really carefully, because we’re probably going to be bigger. So, taking advantage of our size and it not being a weakness. Letting it be a strength and a problem for our opponents.”

The arrival of Kessler, a former five-star recruit, is one of the top gets in all of college basketball this offseason as he brings a versatility to the position that Auburn hasn’t had in the past.

When you add in Jaylin Williams (6-foot-8) and incoming freshman Jabari Smith Jr. (6-foot-9), you also have three big guys that can shoot from the outside.

“I think the thing is, you look at every team and look at what we have. We’re gonna be really big at 4 and 5, bigger than we’ve ever been,” Pearl said. “We’ve got really skilled guys at the position. Dylan is really getting skilled. He’s really mobile. Walker is really mobile. Stretch is really mobile. Jaylin and Jabari are really skilled. I’ve got five really good frontline guys. So that’s going to be different.”

Auburn basketball rises in latest preseason Top 25 by The Athletic

With the addition of a few key transfers, Auburn has gone from just making the cut of the top 25 to being square in the middle.

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Auburn just made the cut at No. 25 the last time The Athletic put out a preseason top 25 for the 2021-22 college basketball season.

This time, the Tigers had plenty of room to spare.

In the latest top 25 by the publication, Bruce Pearl’s team jumped up nine spots to No. 16. The reason? The transfer portal.

Skinny: The Tigers have added three really good transfers since my previous ranking, including arguably the best player in the portal in 7-1 sophomore forward Walker Kessler, who averaged 8.2 points to go along with 5.3 rebounds over the last 10 games at North Carolina. Sophomore point guard Wendell Green averaged 15.8 points and 5.0 assists at Eastern Kentucky, and 6-1 senior guard Desi Sills averaged 7.5 points off the bench at Arkansas. Bruce Pearl is bringing back two of his top four scorers from last season and is adding 6-10 freshman forward Jabari Smith, a top-five high school recruit.

With Auburn Arena likely at full capacity once again, this is going to be a fun basketball season on the Plains.

Twitter reacts to Georgia basketball’s upset win over Auburn

The Georgia Bulldogs and Anthony Edwards knocked off the 13th ranked Auburn Tigers 65-55 in Athens.

The Georgia Bulldogs and Anthony Edwards knocked off the 13th ranked Auburn Tigers 65-55 in Athens. The win is a bright spot in Georgia’s up and down season. Hopes were high following UGA’s big-time win over Memphis before conference play begin.

Tom Crean and the Dawgs have struggled in SEC play, but with this upset win they’re now 13-13 overall. They’ll have to win the SEC tournament to make the NCAA tournament. Still, it was the biggest win of the year for Bulldogs and it came at the expense of hated rival Auburn.

Georgia fans rejoiced on social media:

UGA hoop’s win wasn’t the only upset of the night:

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