Auburn basketball is still in the NIT — and still playing for something

Wednesday night's quarterfinal will be against a good Nevada team playing with purpose. And Auburn has to match that to get to Indy.

(Zach Bland/Auburn Tigers)

AUBURN — Nine days ago, Auburn basketball was in a tough spot.

The Tigers had been told on Selection Sunday that they were not going to the NCAA Tournament. The late-season slide was too damaging to the resume in the eyes of the committee. Auburn would fall short of its new standard of success this time around.

But the team wasn’t done playing basketball. Steven Pearl and his program decided to accept an invitation to the NIT, where it could play up to three more home games and have a chance to end a challenging Year 1 on a higher note.

Still, Auburn had to get off the mat and do that. That was easier said than done, and that was even before the additional adversity of starting center KeShawn Murphy abruptly opting out of finishing his senior season with his team.

“The Monday before the South Alabama game was something,” Pearl recalled Tuesday. “That was tough, because obviously we were all feeling it. You could tell… you weren’t gonna get a ton out of them. I just knew it was gonna take a half of basketball under their belt to realize, ‘Alright, we’ve got to play now.’”

Auburn went from down by double-digits in the first half against South Alabama to a second-half surge for a first-round win. Several days later, it started well against Seattle U and unloaded some offensive firepower against an elite defense for a second-round win that still had its obvious issues on the other end of the floor.

Now, on Wednesday night, Auburn is getting that third and final home game inside Neville Arena in this marathon season. A win over a Nevada team that has won twice as many games (24) as it has lost (12) would send Auburn back to Indianapolis for the semifinals of an NIT in which it’s already the last high-major team standing.

A win would also give Auburn 20 of them for the season, which is no small feat — even if it had to take a run in the consolation tournament to get there. They could get up to 22 when it’s all said and done, and that would certainly put this particular season in a different light.

“To be in a beginning situation that we were in… man, I think that anything and everything possible, we went through it,” shooting guard Kevin Overton said. “To be able to say we were able to get a 20-win season or have a chance to be one of three teams that win their last game of the season?

“I think it’s incredible, and it’s undervalued.”

Since the opening 15 minutes or so of the first-round win over South Alabama, Auburn has played some inspired basketball for a team that was the Final Four-bound No. 1 overall seed this time last year. As Overton put it Tuesday, it’s safe to say the Tigers’ hearts are in a tournament they couldn’t get into — and it’s given them an extra edge.

That fight was on display against Seattle, and it must continue against Nevada.