Observations: Auburn 107, Israel Select 71

Bruce Pearl's Tigers faced a step up in opponent quality on Sunday but still managed to put up triple digits thanks to swarming defense and a whole lot of hustle.

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Doin’ it all rn 😮‍💨 #WarEagle

Jay Bilas has a lot of good things to say about Auburn basketball.

And, yes, it has to be pointed out that the ESPN college basketball analyst and his wife have been personal guests of the program so that he could call the tour action on the SEC Network live with Roxy Bernstein — a special promotional opportunity in August that only Auburn and Kentucky can get.

But Bilas has been a big believer in Bruce Pearl’s team for quite some time now, and he’s widely regarded as one of the best in the business at analyzing the sport.

So when Bilas said “Auburn leads the nation in playing hard” during the broadcast Sunday, it can’t be dismissed as a purely paid-for advertisement.

It also helps that when he said that, Auburn was showing that on the floor, with K.D. Johnson diving for loose balls like it was Game 7 of the NBA Finals and the Tigers as a whole putting on an energetic defensive clinic against a team of grown men who are getting paid good money to play basketball.

Even though Auburn won the second game of its overseas tour by a score of 107-71 on Sunday, it was the defense that stole the show in Tel Aviv. For a team still early in the preseason process, the Tigers physically looked like they were ready to go through the grind of the regular season gauntlet soon.

Here are four Observations, the full stats and the Quote of the Game from Auburn’s big win.