Auburn, Ala- Auburn is swept by the Rebels in the regular season, due to their inefficient offense.
After losing by 15 to the Rebels in Oxford on January 9th, Auburn craved revenge. Their biggest point of emphasis was shooting better than they did in Oxford which was only 32.8%. They failed to do so in this offensive nightmare.
Both defenses stood tall early. Auburn's offense stalled out on all of their first five possessions.This was the cause to both teams being scoreless the first 16:34 of the game until Bruce Stevens scored the first bucket of the game for the visiting Rebels.
After the first media timeout of the game, Auburn finally got on the scoreboard with four points from Horace Spencer and two made free throws by Bryce Brown. It was rather obvious both teams were struggling to find their rhythms early.
Devontae Shuler contributed 12 points to the Ole Miss halftime lead of 30-24. The Rebels may have had the lead but both teams shot poorly from the field. Ole Miss and Auburn shot 33% and 32% respectively.
Chuma Okeke was the highlight of the first half for Auburn. The sophomore from Atlanta, led the team with seven points, six rebounds and a steal in 16 minutes of play at the half.
With 20 minutes left to play, Auburn returned to the court with a fire filled energy on both sides of the floor. Their defense added a level of intensity that was not seen in the first half, with a drawn foul by Okeke and a shot clock violation. Despite this, Ole Miss quickly scored 9 points in the first four minutes to increase their lead.
Quickly after, Auburn would score six unanswered points to force Ole Miss to call timeout. Chuma Okeke scored all six, highlighted by a three pointer and a tomahawk slam dunk to ignite the home crowd.
As if Auburn's first half shooting was not already bad enough, it got even worse in the second half. Midway through the half, the Tigers began a scoring drought where they did not make a field goal for over five minutes. This came to an end however when Danjel Purifoy made an and one layup, with 7:23 to go. This cut the Ole Miss lead down to 4.
Down five with only 3:26 left in the contest, Auburn had no choice but to full court press and they did just that. Meanwhile, both teams on offense take shot after shot at each other, with a back and forth game. The Rebels had to be careful though as they had three men in foul trouble, all holding four fouls with 1:51 remaining. This had all of the ingredients to be an exciting finish in Auburn Arena, but turns out it would not be one.
After a missed three point shot by Jared Harper with 35.0, he fouled Breein Tyree at the 12.1 second mark. Tyree sunk two free throws to add to his team high of 20 points and secure the 60-55 victory for Ole Miss.
The positive note on the Auburn side of the game was obviously Okeke who had a career high of 23 points and tacked on 11 rebounds for another double-double.
After the game, Bruce Pearl said in his press conference, "That's my fault for not attacking their match-ups a little bit. It's difficult." When asked about moving forward, Coach Pearl said, "We're not going to panic. We're going to grind. This is a really good league."
With the loss, Auburn drops to 16-8 (5-6) and looks to get back on track in a hurry. Their next game is Saturday, February 16th at Vanderbilt (11 AM CT).
