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A spirit that is not afraid

Auburn returns home to face UCF

<p>Nov. 12, 2021; Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl during a game against Louisiana Monroe from Auburn Arena in Auburn, Ala.</p>

Nov. 12, 2021; Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl during a game against Louisiana Monroe from Auburn Arena in Auburn, Ala.

The Auburn men’s basketball team returns home on Wednesday when the No. 21 Tigers (5-1) host the UCF Knights (4-1) in their first home game since Nov. 12. It is the return game of a home-and-home series. Auburn lost to the Knights in Orlando last season, 63-55.

Auburn will be looking for a better shooting performance than the 32.3% from the field and 20.6% on 3-pointers it had last year against the Knights. In addition, the Tigers shot just 36.4% from the free-throw line in last year’s loss in Orlando. 

“Last year, UCF probably guarded us as well as anybody all year long,” said Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl. “It was a real challenge for us offensively.”

Auburn is coming off of a 2-1 trip to the Bahamas in which the Tigers lost to Connecticut in double overtime, but defeated Loyola-Chicago and Syracuse. UCF is looking to rebound from its first loss of the season, a 65-62 setback against Oklahoma.

It will be Auburn’s second game against a team from the American Athletic Conference this season. The Tigers defeated South Florida 58-52 on November 19. 

“This is the same league that South Florida was in," Pearl said. "South Florida, in the American, was picked ninth and gave us all we wanted down there in Tampa, and this Central Florida team is picked fifth."

UCF is led by head coach Johnny Dawkins, in his sixth year with the Knights. Dawkins has a record of 98-61 as head coach of the Knights and took UCF to the NCAA Tournament in 2019. 

“Johnny Dawkins...has done a phenomenal job at Central Florida,” said Pearl. “This will be the second-best team we’ve played against, behind probably UConn.”

The Knights average 72.8 points per game, placing them in a tie for 175th in the country. UCF has only topped 80 points once this season, a 95-point outburst against Miami in the second game of the season. Auburn has only allowed an opponent to surpass 70 points once - Connecticut scored 115 on the Tigers in a 50-minute contest.

Pearl attributes this to the tempo at which UCF plays. 

“I think the reason why their score is because they’re so solid defensively," Pearl said. "They’re one of the top-ten teams in the country at making you take time off the clock when you’re on offense."

Despite the low-scoring offense, UCF is 60th nationally in 3-point percentage, making their 3-pointers at a rate of 37.8%. 

“Those guards can each make plays. They’re all great three-points shooters,” said Pearl. “Our guards...are going to have a great challenge trying to guard UCF’s guards.”

The Tigers’ average of 81.3 points per game places them at 43rd nationally. The Knights allow 65.2 points per game, but excluding a game against Miami in which they allowed 89, that number drops to 59.3, a number which would place them at 37th nationally as opposed to their current rank of 115th nationally.

“It’s the best defensive team we’ve played against so far,” said Pearl. “They average 20 points a game from turning people over.” 

Pearl continued to laud the Knights’ defense. 

“They do a very good job defensively communicating. They do an excellent job switching in their man-to-man defenses and they’ve got great size in the guard spot and their forwards and centers are mobile.”

One advantage the Knights have is their experience as a team. Every player who scored for the Knights in last year’s game against Auburn returned to UCF this season. 

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“They’re one of the oldest teams in college basketball,” noted Pearl. “They have a lot of juniors and seniors and a lot of fourth and fifth-year guys.”

The tip-off for Wednesday night’s game will be at 7 p.m. CST and it will be streamed on SEC Network-plus and ESPN-plus. It is the first of two home games for Auburn this week. The Tigers will host Yale on Saturday.


Matthew Wallace | Assistant Sports Editor

Matthew is a senior from Huntsville, Alabama, majoring in journalism. He started with The Plainsman in fall 2021.

Twitter: @mattwallaceAU


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