This had all hype, students who camped out for days, with ESPN’s College GameDay in the morning all swirling into the culmination of, at last, the Saturday evening tip-off for No. 13 Auburn against No. 22 Kentucky at Neville Arena.
As Auburn struggled mightily on its home floor, it saw all that crash to a halt that can be described as nothing other than stunning in a 70-59 loss to Kentucky.
Auburn’s perfect record at home this season is no more and their first loss at home since Feb. 11, 2023, against Alabama.
Here are 3 takeaways:
What happened to Auburn’s offense?
Take a quick look at the box score. It looks much more like the story when Auburn has been on the road this season. Look at this box score and it would be easy to assume Auburn had played Kentucky at Rupp Arena.
It didn’t. This game was at Neville Arena.
Auburn didn’t get above 30% shooting until there were under 14 minutes remaining in the second half. It hardly ever got better than 31%.
Auburn has not played anywhere near this level at all at home this season.
Typically, that’s happened on the road. On Saturday, it happened at home.
Auburn fell behind by 14 in the early moments of the second half. And while Auburn continually worked, scrapping in an attempt to dig out of the deficit it had made for itself, it never got closer than five points.
The second half saw Auburn play with more life than it had in the first, but never quite enough. Auburn just kept missing shots. Simple as that.
It finished shooting the game 17-54 (31%). It was 4-22 on 3-pointers. It was 13-23 on layups. It was 0-1 on dunks. It was 21-30 from the free-throw line.
Auburn cut its turnovers down in the second half but still were outscored 23-10 in points off turnovers.
Auburn never led for even a second of this game.
Just nothing worked.
Auburn’s had days like this on the road. Never at home.
Auburn played a first half unlike any it’s had all season at home
Neville Arena was essentially silent at halftime, save for the music playing out of the loudspeakers.
It was a stunned silence. And it’s clear why fans were stunned. After so much energy led into this game and so much hype, those same fans who’d camped out for days were turned to just staring at their phones and trying to contemplate what had just happened in the arena where Auburn had for so long looked like it could beat the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls.
Auburn came out and shot 28% from the field in the first half. It didn’t have a ton of bad looks. It just missed shot after shot. Or when a good look wasn’t there for Auburn to miss, Pearl’s team committed several sloppy turnovers.
Auburn only made three more shots in the first half (9) than it had turnovers (6). And Kentucky had 15 points off those turnovers. Auburn had zero points off four Kentucky turnovers.
And that put Auburn in a hole as large as 12 points with 45 seconds before halftime. It went into the locker room down by 10. Auburn’s 29 first half points were the fewest its had at Neville Arena all season.
It all set the tone.
What to make of Jaylin Williams’ injury
For the sake of this story, published just as the game ended and before head coach Bruce Pearl could give any update, here’s what we know about Jaylin Williams: The Auburn power forward rose up for a powerful drunk with about 10 minutes to play in the second half.
UPDATE: Pearl did not appear hopeful about Williams’ status. He is planning to be without Williams. More here.
He missed it and faced a lot of contact while in the air. That led to him getting tangled as he came town and seeming to have his right knee bend awkwardly.
Williams was down for several minutes being looked at by trainers. He wasn’t able to put weight on his right leg as he was taken back to the locker room and was quickly ruled out by Auburn.
It’s a situation that didn’t look good and doesn’t appear to be good thus far. Losing Williams was clearly demoralizing in the scope of this game and the game got away from Auburn after that.
But the scope is larger. Williams is a leader on this team and averages nearly 13.5 points per game. Williams, the winningest player in the history of the program been among the best stories on a team full of good storylines this year.
This will be updated.
Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at mcohen@al.com