No. 2 Auburn men’s basketball will host the Monmouth Hawks on Monday, Dec. 30 to conclude a rigorous 2024-25 non-conference schedule before starting SEC play next weekend.
The Tigers will look to emerge from the one of the toughest non-conference slates in the country with only one loss — a six-point defeat at Duke inside Cameron Indoor Stadium. Auburn owns victories over No. 4 Houston, No. 5 Iowa State, No. 12 North Carolina, Ohio State,and No. 16 Purdue in what is the hardest non-conference schedule in the history of the program.
Auburn currently ranks first in the country in KenPom, first in NET, top-10 in strength of schedule and holds a 6-1 record against quad-one opponents, while also achieving the highest-rated offensive efficiency in the history of KenPom. However, the Tigers are still sitting at No. 2 in the AP poll behind Tennessee.
“Well, I think there are two ways to look at it. One, we are going to be continuing a grind. For others in our league, or for some of the teams in our league, they're going to be starting to grind because they've not played the schedule that we played,” Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl said. “I think you take it one at a time. I think you need to understand who you are, get your players to go to their strengths, stay away from their weaknesses, continue to make each other better and understand it's going to be about matchups.”
Monmouth comes into the matchup fresh off its second win of the season over Fairfield, defeating the Stags 88-74. The Hawks’ victory over Fairfield was their first home game of the season due to a plethora of neutral site games and road affairs at Michigan State, No. 24 Rutgers, Wichita State, Seton Hall and others. Monmouth kicked off the season with eight straight losses before claiming its first win of the 2024-25 campaign against Seton Hall on Nov. 30.
“You know, it's an interesting team,” Pearl said. “King Rice's team has played a really tough schedule. They played, you know, Michigan State, Rutgers and Wichita State. They've only played one home game. They've only won two games, but those two games they won in the last four games, and they beat Seton Hall at Seton Hall, I think it says a lot.”
The Hawks are led by standout sophomore guard Abdi Bashir Jr., who averages 21.6 points, 2.2 rebounds and 1.6 assists a game. Bashir sits at ninth in D-1 in points per game, with his best performances coming at No. 24 Rutgers and at Stephen F. Austin, where he tallied 38 and 30 points, respectively. He is shooting 42.0% from the field and 42.9% from behind the arc, posting about 9.0 three-point attempts per outing.
After setting two straight career-highs against NIU and Rutgers, Bashir was named the Oscar Robertson National Player of the Week by the United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) earlier this season. He recorded 63 points combined versus the Shockers and Scarlet Knights, including 12 triples and a perfect 11-of-11 from the charity stripe. Bashir is the first Monmouth player ever to receive this honor.
“They got a great, great player, in Abdi Bashir Jr.,” Pearl said. “He's really tight. Watched him a little bit, and reminds me a little bit of Chad Baker (-Mazara). Long, can really score the basketball and shoot it. And he's tied for second nationally, averaging four three pointers a game. So obviously, he's a really, really good player.”
King Rice is in his 14th season at the helm for the Hawks and became the winningest D-I head coach in Monmouth men’s basketball history in February 2022. Rice has also earned a multitude of honors, including three MAAC Coach of the Year awards, named the 2016 John McLendon National Coach of the Year and has led the Hawks to three MAAC regular season titles.
“King Rice is their head coach,” Pearl said. “And of course, he played at North Carolina, and that win over Seton Hall was his 10th high major win at Monmouth. So it's an interesting team. They play such a tough non-conference schedule to get ready, you know, for their league, which is one of the better major leagues in the east, the MAAC… Their record kind of goes out the door.”
As for Auburn, Pearl and company are seeking to build off an extremely successful start to the season while the Tigers prepare for what should be a brutal SEC gauntlet in the coming months. Pearl knows his squad is performing at a high level right now but recognizes potential improvements the Tigers can make heading into the new year.
“From a reflection standpoint, you know, we're playing good basketball on both ends of the floor,” Pearl said. “We're sharing it, we're shooting it, I think we're defending it well. We're rebounding the ball a little bit better, and so areas that we can continue to improve on would be transition offense and defense. And, you know, continuing to be able to as we get ready for the league play, teams in the league really know us, and they'll throw lots of different things at us...And how well we respond to that, you know, will determine whether or not we keep staying humble, hungry and healthier.”
The Tigers and Hawks will tip off inside Neville Arena on Monday, Dec. 30 at 5:30 p.m. CST and can be streamed on SECN+.
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Gunner is a freshman majoring in journalism. He started with The Plainsman in the fall 2024.
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