The Stretch 4: Who will step up for Auburn in a big road game at UGA?
After a much-needed break, the Tigers are back Saturday. They will need some clutch performances — especially without one of their stars.
(Steven Leonard/Auburn Tigers)
Don’t let the records fool you. Don’t let the point spread fool you, either.
After a much-needed midweek break, Auburn basketball will return to the court Saturday evening at rival Georgia.
The Tigers are 20-6 overall and 9-4 in the SEC. The Bulldogs are 15-11 overall and 5-8 in the SEC. Auburn enters the weekend as the No. 5 team in KenPom, opening as a 7.5-point road favorite over a Georgia team that is outside the top 80 nationally.
A little over a month ago, Georgia was 12-3 overall and off to a 2-0 league start. Then the Bulldogs dropped eight of their next 10 games, including six straight losses. The skid ended Wednesday night with a 12-point road win over struggling Vanderbilt.
But, even though Georgia sits at No. 11 in the SEC with just a handful of games left to play, Auburn winning in Athens this weekend isn’t a given. Stegeman Coliseum has been a place of struggle for visitors this season — including the Tigers’ fellow title contenders.
“They’ve had a really good year,” Bruce Pearl said this week. “It’s just the quality of the league has put them in a situation where they (had) lost seven of eight games in the league. You look at their home losses to Tennessee, South Carolina, Florida, Alabama — they’ve already played those four teams at home and lost close to all of them.”
Tennessee was down by 11 at Georgia with 6:24 to play. Alabama was down 17-2 early and trailed by 12 with 10 minutes to go. South Carolina and Florida both trailed by double-digits in the first half.
“They're insane at home,” center Dylan Cardwell said. “I think all their home games have been an 8- or 10-point margin. They've been up against Florida, they've been up against Alabama. They've been up against good teams. They have a really good home-court advantage. Even though they're (5-8) in the SEC, they haven't given up. They're still a hungry team.”
All four of those teams Pearl mentioned came back to win in Athens, digging deep to overcome a Georgia team that is starting to get more support from the fan base in Year 2 under Mike White.
Auburn could easily find itself in a similar situation Saturday night. Can the Tigers do what their fellow top teams in the league have done — even without fifth-year senior star Jaylin Williams — and stay in the hunt?
“Because we’ve been so good at home, there are some that would say, ‘Hey, when we don’t play at home, we don’t win,’” Pearl said. “We have not played great on the road this year. We’ve got wins at Ole Miss and Arkansas and Vanderbilt, but we’ve not shot it particularly well on the road.
“But we have three more opportunities in our last five games to dispel that. Not going to be easy, but that’s the opportunity that is in front of us.”
For more on the opportunity in Athens on Saturday, along with more insight on what the Tigers could do in a matchup without Williams, here is this week’s Stretch 4.
SG K.D. Johnson (Zach Bland/Auburn Tigers)
Auburn will need more out of its guards at UGA
After the loss to Kentucky last Saturday, Pearl didn’t hold back in his postgame comments: “We need to get better guard play. It’s clear. It’s clear we need to get better guard play. We’ll see if those guys can get it all figured out.”