Auburn has just completed the toughest non-conference schedule in their basketball history with a 12-1 record. During that span, Auburn has defeated 3 teams currently ranked in the Top 25 (Houston, Iowa State, and Purdue), North Carolina (who was ranked at the time) and a tough Memphis team to claim the Maui Invitational title. Auburn is undefeated at home and on neutral sites this season. The only loss, so far, was on the road to #4 Team in the country, the Duke Blue Devils by 6 points.
The tough road is just beginning though. Auburn is set to enter an extremely tough SEC Conference schedule. Let’s discuss the three biggest concerns as they enter SEC play.
While this team has performed well, here are 3 things that can prove to be issues for Auburn.
Point Guard Play
This seems odd to say of a team that is setting records for Offensive efficiency. However, there have been times during the bigger games where the offense seems stagnant. This is directly related to the play of the point guard during those times. Coach Pearl and his staff has shortened the rotation at Point Guard and cut a significant about of the play time for JP Pegues. The Furman Senior Guard, who transferred in during this past off season, has just not found his groove. He has now been relegated to “garbage time” minutes mostly.
Denver Jones is rounding into his role much better, since the Duke loss. He is figuring out how to contribute with points while still playing the role of facilitator. In the big games leading up to the gam in Cameron Indoor Arena (Houston, Iowa State, North Carolina, and Memphis) and including that game against Duke, Jones posted his lowest shooting percentages and NET ratings of the season. To put it plainly, he struggled offensively in those games. Auburn will need his offense to be closer to his output vs Ohio State and Purdue to keep pace during the SEC games.
Tahaad Pettiford is the player that has take over the minutes that JP Pegues has vacated. The Freshman guard was initially going to play more off of the ball, but with the early struggles from Pegues, Pettiford has needed to step in and play more point guard. Unlike Denver Jones, scoring has been no issue for him during those big games. In fact, it has been quite the opposite. Pettiford has had his best games against the best competition. The question for him will be staying out of foul trouble and on the floor. With the physicality and atheleticism increasing, will he be able to stay on the floor enough to allow the rotations and point guard to stay solid?
Falling in Love with the Three
Auburn has shot well from 3 this season. As a team, Auburn is shooting 37.1%, so far, this season. There are 5 Tigers with at least 10 attempts from 3 on the season that are shooting over 37% this season (Howard, Jones, Baker-Mazara, Kelly, and Pettiford). Unlike last season, that number has not seemed to be impacted by being away from Neville Arena. Auburn is shooting 36.8% in games away from home this season.
Those all seem to be great numbers (and they are). However, the potential issue is that they settle for shooting 3s (some of them very early in the shot clock). That tendency has caused some slow starts and allowed some teams to hang around in games. For a team that shares the ball as well as Auburn, this should never be an issue. However, it creeps in occasionally.
The Whistle
This, in my opinion, is the biggest issue that could impact Auburn Basketball this season. There are a few ways that the game will be impacted by the officiating.
- 1. Free Throw shooting: As a team, Auburn is shooting 75.5% from the Free Throw line. That is good for 77th in the country, which is average and not a terrible number, until you peel it back a bit. Four of the top six players in Free Throw Rate (FTR) have the lowest Free Throw Shooting Percentage (Broome, Cardwell, Chaney Johnson, and Jahki Howard).
- 2. Getting to the line: While they are not a great Free Throw shooting team, Auburn is even worse at drawing fouls. They do not seem to get the benefit of the whistle very often. In fact, their FTR (29.4 According to Barttorvik) ranks 267th in the country and next to last in the SEC so far this season.
- 3. Foul Trouble: On the opposite side of that coin, Auburn is the 3rd worst in the conference in terms of sending teams to the foul line (FTRD of 33.6). The only teams that send opponents to the FT line more than Auburn are the Mississippi schools. The Free Throw disparity in the Duke game was a huge factor in the final outcome.
Final Thoughts
- As tough as the non-conference schedule was, this conference schedule is going to even more of a monstrous task. The SEC is loaded this season and there are 11 top 25 matchups for Auburn, 4 of them on the road. Can Auburn make a run for another SEC regular season title under Bruce Pearl?