Auburn’s struggles on the road refuse to go away.
Chris Silva scored a career-high 32 points and grabbed 14 rebounds to help South Carolina hold off the late comeback and stun No. 16 Auburn 80-77 Tuesday night inside Colonia Life Arena.
"He (Silva) was dominating in there," Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl said. "You can point to Anfernee and Horace and put it all on them, that was the matchup, but it’s a team effort. Didn’t have enough pressure on the basketball.”
The Gamecocks (10-8, 5-1 SEC) rebounded at home after a 22-point loss on the road at No. 25 LSU on Saturday to tie No. 8 Kentucky for third in the conference standings.
Auburn (13-5, 2-3 SEC) used a 12-0 run to take a 73-71 lead at the 4:01 mark after trailing the majority of the game, only to lose the lead again when South Carolina’s Felipe Haase drained a 3-pointer from the corner with 31 seconds left to give the Gamecocks a 78-77 advantage.
"In the second half, I just think it was just like that grit and toughness, the will to win, a little bit of experience," Pearl said. "They’re not a great 3-point shooting team but the big kid, Haase, hit the one in the corner. We came off the strong-strong-side corner and he knocked it in. That was a big play."
After an Auburn timeout, Bryce Brown drove to the basket and kicked to an open Chuma Okeke with five seconds left, only to see his jumper clank off the back of the rim. Danjel Purifoy corralled the offensive board but missed the put-back, and Silva came out of the scram with the ball.
Silva knocked down two more free throws to make it a three-point deficit, and the Tigers failed to get a shot off before the horn sounded as the ball slipped through Brown’s fingertips on the ensuing possession.
"It’s amazing how much they allow him to do,” Pearl said. “He goes to the free throw line second-most of any player in the country. It’s really difficult. It’s really difficult."
Auburn was 25-of-61 (41 percent) from the field and managed to make just 7-of-25 (28 percent) from three-point territory, after missing their first nine of the game. The loss drops the Tigers to ninth in the conference standings and to 1-3 this season in true road games.
"We’ve got to make shots,” Pearl said. “We were 7-of-25 from 3. And of the misses that we had, they were good looks. Chuma’s got to make more than 1-for-4, Jared’s got to make more than 1-for-6, Bryce has got to make more than 3-for-8. They got good looks and those are shots we make, we win.”
Jared Harper and Brown scored 17 apiece, but were a combined 4-for-14 from deep. Okeke notched 13 points, and grabbed a team-high seven rebounds.
Silva earned his double-double before the 15-minute mark of the second half and finished 11-of-12 from the field, and 10-of-11 from the free-throw line. Hassani Gravett added 13 points on 5-of-9 from the field and 3-of-6 from the three-point line.
Auburn, which is still without Austin Wiley because of a lower right leg injury, was outmatched down low all night and couldn’t shoot its way out of it, going without a field goal for the final four minutes. Both forwards, Horace Spencer and Anfernee McLemore, fouled out before the 7-minute mark in the second half.
“Proud of the team — they battled, they competed,” Pearl said. “A lesser character team would’ve got run up out of here."
The Tigers travel to Starkville to take on No. 22 Mississippi State on Saturday.
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