With another electric start led by star Johni Broome, No. 4 Auburn ran past Memphis on Wednesday evening 90-76 to claim the program’s first Maui Invitational championship winning three games in three days – just the third SEC team ever to win the prestigious Thanksgiving week tournament.
Just seven games into the 2024-25 season, the Tigers have picked up three wins against AP top-12 opponents, four wins over top-30 Kenpom teams, a Maui Invitational championship and could very likely find themselves ranked inside the top two come Monday afternoon in what’s been a historic start to Bruce Pearl’s 11th season at Auburn.
“Maui is, you know, is a prize,” Pearl said following the win. “This has been a great springboard, but the confidence that we're going to get from this is that we can play with anybody. Where do we go from here? I promise you this, we'll stay humble and hungry.”
Similar to Tuesday night’s performance against No. 12 North Carolina, the orange and blue Tigers surged out to a 9-0 lead and led by 10-or-more points from the 8:38 mark in the first half onward.
"You let that team get up 9-0 on you, you can't recover from that," Memphis head coach Penny Hardaway said following the loss.
From the opening tip, Broome was the king of the Island, named the Maui Invitational MVP, with double-doubles in all three performances – recording the latter two double-doubles before the half.
An early national player of the year front runner, Broome became the first Auburn player to record five-straight double-doubles since the late Jeff Moore in 1988.
“I mean, the player of the year don't really matter to me. You know, I care about winning alone. We keep winning. That's how the eyes are on you,” Broome said.
Broome finished the day with 21 points – a fourth straight game of 20-or-more points scored, 16 rebounds and 6 assists along with a steal and 4 blocks. In three straight days of competition, the senior played 36, 33 and 32 minutes of action.
In the three game tournament, Broome averaged 21.6 points per game, shooting an average of 52% percent from the field and averaging 15.0 rebounds along with 3.0 blocks.
Alongside Broome, counterpart Dylan Cardwell had a career-high 18 points shooting a perfect 8-for-8 with a rare three pointer – the fourth make from deep in the fifth-year seniors career. The two big men combined for 12 of Auburn’s 23 assists – each had six a-piece.
“And one of the things that Dylan and I talked about him coming back was not playing behind Johni, but playing with him, and we worked on it all summer, all fall, and it wasn't great this summer or fall, right? And they wanted to play together so badly,” Pearl said. “So it's just incredible. They got great chemistry. They trust each other, they listen to each other and I believe we got the best front line in college basketball.”
Auburn’s performance down-low was simply dominating leading points in the paint 44-36, out-rebounded Memphis by 6 and recorded 5 blocks. The orange and blue Tigers turned Memphis over 11 times resulting in 20 points.
With 26 points against No. 2 UConn and 23 points against Michigan State, Memphis guard Tyrese Hunter didn’t score in the first half against Auburn shooting 0-for-3 from the field. Hunter finished the day with 11 points – his second lowest point total of the season.
The blue and gray Tigers only attempted nine shots from deep – their lowest of the season by eight shots – after taking 22 and 23 in their first two Maui contests.
“Memphis is better from three and free than they are from two,” Pearl said. “So we pressed up, we switched out. We didn't mind bad matchups, but we just had to make sure we didn't leave the perimeter.”
Auburn finished the day with four players in double figures; Broome, Cardwell, Chad Baker-Mazara and Denver Jones. Baker-Mazara and Jones both scored 10-or-more points in the trio of Maui matchups.
“Coach Pearl always says ‘it's going to be a different guy every night’ and you saw it in this tournament. It can be Chad. It can be Denver. It could be Tahaad. It can be anybody. You know, all of our games are someone different. It's just amazing to see,” Cardwell said.
Wednesday’s win marks the fourth, and easily the biggest, pre-conference tournament win in the last six years with Bruce Pearl at the helm. It’s still just November in a five month long season, but seven games in Auburn finds itself at the top of the sport.
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Patrick is a junior from Auburn, Alabama, double majoring in journalism and marketing. He started with The Plainsman in the fall of 2022.
You can follow him on X (Twitter) at @patrickabingham
