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A spirit that is not afraid

Auburn suffers loss in tournament quarterfinals to Texas A&M

"We didn't score enough points off those turnovers. The offense in the second half was bad."

<p>Auburn's Janiah McKay shoots a three defended by A&amp;M's Ciera Johnson as time expires. A&amp;M won 64-62.&nbsp;</p>

Auburn's Janiah McKay shoots a three defended by A&M's Ciera Johnson as time expires. A&M won 64-62. 

When the Tigers and Aggies met for the first time this season on Jan. 24, Chennedy Carter scored 28 points including the game-winner with four seconds left to give the Aggies the 69-67 win over Auburn while Janiah McKay led the Tigers with 17 points. 

Tonight, in the SEC quarterfinals, the story was strikingly similar for the Tigers and Aggies rematch, only the player who scored 28 this time was Kayla Wells for A&M. Wells hit the game-winner with six seconds left while Janiah McKay led Auburn with 17 points in the 64-62 loss to Texas A&M.

A&M's star guard Carter was unable to play due to a finger injury that she suffered against Arkansas in the final game of the regular season. She is supposed to be back in time for the NCAA tournament or so the team hopes. Carter leads the SEC in points per game with 22.7; Carter was also recently recognized as a member of the first team All-SEC this past week.   

Auburn and Texas A&M struggled offensively in tonight's matchup as both teams had turnover totals in the double-digits. Auburn had 15 turnovers throughout the game, but Auburn also forced A&M to cough the ball up a season-high 26 times scoring 21 points off these 26 turnovers.  

"(This was) definitely a winnable game," Auburn head coach Terri Williams-Flournoy said. "We turned them over 26 times. Offense was the problem. We didn't score enough points off those turnovers. The offense in the second half was bad."

Despite the woes on offense from both sides, A&M was still able to shoot 59 percent from the field, while Auburn shot a poor 46 percent. Auburn offensively struggled tonight, McKay and Unique Thompson were the only Tigers to reach double figures in scoring with 17 and 13 respectively. Crystal Primm led the Tigers in assists with six on the night.

Auburn was up at halftime to the tune of 32-28, similar to the regular season game against the Aggies in which Auburn also had the lead at the half. Just like the regular season matchup, the Aggies and Tigers would continue to exchange the lead back-and-forth tonight. Tonight's game saw nine lead changes and ten times in which the game was tied during the 40 minutes of action, while the regular season matchup saw four lead changes and six separate times in which the game was tied. 

Auburn's offense evaporated not only in the second half, but in the final four minutes and only managed to score one basket during that time span. Following the eventual game-winner Auburn would call timeout with six seconds left but McKay slipped after receiving the inbound pass at mid-court and her shot would end up falling short of the basket. 

The 3-seed Aggies will move on to take on 10-seed Arkansas in the semifinals tomorrow night on ESPNU. Auburn will have to head home and wait for its fate to be revealed during ESPN's NCAA tournament "Selection Monday" on March 18th at 6 p.m. CST. 

During "Selection Monday", the full 64-seeded NCAA tournament will be revealed. The "good news" for the Tigers is that before tonight's matchup, they were projected as a 10-seed in the NCAA tournament according to ESPN's Bracketologist Charlie Creme. Auburn will have a long time to wait for March 18th until then.  


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