Auburn is in its first season under Steven Pearl. There was an expected dip for Auburn under the younger Pearl, but not to the level of blowouts. Auburn is coming off a blowout loss to Purdue, falling 88-60, and after the game, Pearl spoke about his team's performance in the contest.
“I’m proud of my team,” Pearl said after his team lost by 28 to Purdue. “People might not want to hear me say that right now, but I am. These dudes, they do everything we ask them to do. We've put them in front of a lot of really, really good opponents. We'll be better for it in the long run.”
This is not the first time that Auburn has been blown out this year. They are 8-4 on the season, and have a one-point loss to Houston. Still, they lost by 30 to Michigan and by 29 to Arizona. Pearl also addressed the difference between those two games and this one.
“Tonight is the one exception where I thought we competed at a level that the score wasn't what I thought it was,” Pearl said. “The Michigan and Arizona games, we just got our ass kicked. We didn't execute, we didn't play with the effort and energy that we typically do. Tonight, I thought we flew around. I thought we battled.”
He is correct, the team did not execute. They shot just 21-58 from the field, good or just 36 percent. Meanwhile, Purdue took just 59 field goal attempts, going 33-59. It was not a difference at the free-throw stripe that hurt Auburn either, just execution. Auburn was 11 of 16 from the stripe, but Purdue went 10 of 10.
“We missed shots. And when you miss shots in tough environments, that's going to happen against a really good team,” Pearl finished his conference with.
Fans may not want to hear what Pearl has to say in this situation, but he is correct. Auburn had all the chances to make this a tight game, or even win the game, but they could not hit shots, from the field or the line. This is different than the other two blowouts, when Michigan and Arizona were just clearly better.
Auburn has a chance to correct course before its next game. They play on December 29 against Queen before opening SEC play against Georgia on the road on January 3.
