Auburn’s Keshawn Hall goes in for a slam against Arkansas Saturday night at Neville Arena. Hall was unstoppable, showing his versatile array of skills in scoring 32 points in the 95-73 win. (Auburn Athletics)
Denied a game-winning shot in a controversial ending to the Texas A&M game, Auburn’s KeShawn Murphy responded with 16 points and 10 rebounds against Arkansas. (Auburn Athletics)
Looking at the first 0-3 SEC start since 2021, first-year Auburn coach Steven Pearl saw his Tigers steamroll Arkansas. “We had to get that one,” he said. “It didn’t matter who it was against. We had to win that one ’cause you can’t dig yourself into a 0-3 hole in this conference and expect to have real success.” (Auburn Athletics)
AUBURN, Ala. — If you are an Auburn fan, put a bag over your head and plugged your ears since September, then suddenly had your senses restored Saturday night, it’s likely you would have thought Bruce Pearl was still coaching the Tigers and they were heading back to the Final Four.
A Pearl is still coaching them and Steven Pearl, the spruce from Bruce, received a desperately needed 95-73 victory over No. 15-ranked Arkansas and Hall of Fame coach John Calipari; Pearl had six losses coming into the game while Calipari has been to that many Final Fours. In fact, Pearl, whom Auburn hired at half-price after his father retired last September, was looking at an 0-3 start to SEC play (for the first time since 2020-21) the way someone looks when they’re stuck on the tracks and facing an oncoming train.
But it was Pearl who wrenched the locomotive away from Calipari.
“They were desperate and they played that way,” observed a humbled Calipari, whose Razorbacks got Razorwhacked. “That’s not my team. I’m burning the tape. Let’s move on. Let’s get on the bus fast.”
Pearl acknowledged his first SEC victory — the third-largest winning margin in school history against a ranked team — just meant more. It also underscored the need for patience as he becomes his own coach, not just someone who tries to wear his father’s giant shoes.
“We had to get that one,” he said. “It didn’t matter who it was against. We had to win that one ’cause you can’t dig yourself into a 0-3 hole in this conference and expect to have real success. They’ve got a couple guys that are going to get their name called in June in the NBA Draft and our guys got up for that. The challenge now is we’ve got to do that every night.”
Four nights after the Tigers had barfed up a 16-point lead, then saw KeShawn Murphy’s 35-foot buzzer shot with a sliver of a second remaining get robbed by a video review in a 90-88 loss to Texas A&M, Auburn played so well you might have thought the statue of Charles Barkley outside of Neville Arena had come to life and he had brought Chuck Person, Johni Broome, Walker Kessler and Jabari Smith along with him.
An aroused sellout crowd of 9,121 certainly behaved that way. After a tepid pregame, The Jungle was savage and full of fangs. When they swept the floor during timeouts, they could just as well been mopping up blood because Calipari didn’t have a tourniquet big enough to close all the wounds nor ear plugs wide enough to stifle all the noise.
After five early lead changes, the Tigers led for 37 of 40 minutes, pushed the lead to 13 points midway through the first half, then to 17, then to 29 points late in the game. What mattered most was Auburn won 48-28 in the paint, 37-28 on the boards, had 20 assists and only 10 turnovers.
“They were beating us to every loose ball, every rebound,” Calipari said. “We’re a lane-touch team. What was the lane-touch team today? You drove it and it was rough.”
Arkansas was a mere 17 of 37 from two-point range (46%); the Tigers were 24 of 38 (63%).
“They were great,” Calipari said. “We’ve lost to three top-10 teams (Michigan State, Duke and Houston) and we had a chance to beat all three. Tonight, we had no chance. They just threw us around. You go up and down the lineup, they all played well. I don’t think they had a guy play bad.”
Back in coach Nolan Richardson’s day, the Razorbacks’ relentless press gave everybody 40 Minutes of Hell. This time, the Tigers gave Arkansas 40 Minutes of Hall, as senior forward Keyshawn Hall continued to play like an All-American with 32 points. He missed only four of 24 shots if you count three-pointers and free throws and generally gutted the Razorbacks in the paint.
“We did play desperate,” Hall said, “but we knew what we could do.”
Hall now has back-to-back 32-point games — the first time in 32 years that’s happened at Auburn — and is the only SEC player to be in the top 10 in scoring and rebounding with 17 straight double-figure games. He also led the country in made free throws (109) coming into Saturday.
“I took this game kind of personal,” he said. “I came through the transfer portal. Arkansas was one of my top four schools. They didn’t recruit me as hard as the other guys.”
As well as Hall played offensively, Pearl was happier with his effort on the other end of the floor, especially avoiding needless fouls.
“He had two blocked shots tonight (the only two the Tigers had) and every time there was penetration and he rotated over, he did such a good job of walling up and just getting vertical and not slapping down,” Pearl said. “That’s something that he’s really struggled with. I thought our defense really answered the bell. That was probably the best we’ve collectively played defensively against a really good team. I think our switching bothered them and we made some adjustments in their ball screens.”
Sophomore guard Tahaad Pettiford, the most recognizable name remaining on an entirely new roster from last year’s Final Four team, also made some adjustments after being let back in the starting lineup — he showed the team comes first.
“We have an issue with guys being on time,” said Pearl, who reasoned the bench was a cure. On Saturday night, Pettiford sacrificed his 15 points-per-game average and had as many assists (7) as points (8). Hall added five assists.
“When your two best players have 12 assists, that makes a difference,” Pearl said.
Pearl was also proud of the maturity Auburn showed after what could have been a devastating loss to Texas A&M.
“Lesser teams would’ve continued to harp on that,” he said, “and let that affect their performance and get too low.”
Murphy didn’t mope about the controversial call, responding with 16 points and 10 rebounds, his first double-double of the season.
He said the shot that didn’t count did count with him: “I took it as a win.”
The Tigers were nowhere near letting the officials decide Saturday night’s game. Six players were in double-figure plusses, led by Hall’s +28.
But is Auburn truly that good or did the Razorbacks have a wretched night? What happened to Arkansas was not self-inflicted.
“They took it to us in every way,” Calipari said. “Our guys are not robots. They’ll have these games. Maybe it’s a girlfriend, I don’t know. But that wasn’t my team. Now, we could even say Auburn made us look that way. I’m telling you, we played other teams that played hard and were desperate and we were desperate back and ended up winning games. Give them credit. It’s not like we were a bad team. We got spanked.”
If the Tigers keep winning that way, one Pearl will look as good as another.
“That was a great win for him,” Calipari said before hurriedly getting on that bus out of the Plains.
