Former Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl retired at a strange time, just six weeks before the start of the 2024-25 college basketball season. However, he did not leave the cupboard bare for his predecessor, Steven Pearl.
That is one of the main reasons why The Athletic is still high on the Tigers despite the sudden coaching change. In their “SEC men’s basketball preseason rankings,” The Athletic slides Auburn in at No. 3 behind No. 1 Florida and No. 2 Kentucky, thanks to Pettiford sticking around the program despite talks of him joining the NBA or even the transfer portal. It also helps matters that Bruce Pearl built a solid team around him with his last-ever recruiting effort.
“(Pettiford) was terrific in ball screens last season — Auburn’s roll and replace worked about every time with him as the handler — and he was at his best in big games. It’s a good bet he can handle the burden of being a star,” CJ Moore of The Athletic writes.
Moore continues, “Auburn also got Pettiford some help. Hall was one of the best scorers in the Big 12 and is a good fit in Auburn’s flex offense. The Tigers also used the portal to find solid role players in Overton and Murphy and a scorer oozing with potential in Freeman, who had NBA scouts eyeing him at the Division II level. For the second straight year, he could give Auburn a super sixth man. Auburn also landed two of the top three junior-college transfers and two top-100 freshmen, an impressive reload following the best season in school history.”
Auburn has three players in its projected starting lineup who averaged over 10 points per game last season. Outside of Pettiford’s 11.6 points per game efforts as a freshman, forward Keyshawn Hall led the Big 12 in scoring last season with 18.8 points per game at UCF, and his forward counterpart Keshawn Murphy scored 11.7 points per game at Mississippi State. Kevin Overton scored 7.8 points per game as the two in Texas Tech’s system, and Serbian player Filip Jovic is expected to add size to the five position in his first season as a Tiger.
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Auburn will be tasked to replace the production of Johni Broome, who averaged a double-double per game as a senior with 18.6 points per game and 10.8 rebounds per game. Key players such as Miles Kelly, Chad Baker-Mazara, and Denver Jones have also departed the program. It will be interesting to see how well the new-look roster meshes together alongside new head coach Steven Pearl.
The first look at the revamped Auburn Tigers basketball squad will be on Wednesday, Oct. 15, against Oklahoma State at Boutwell Auditorium in Birmingham for a preseason exhibition. The Tigers will also face Memphis in a preseason scrimmage before opening the season on Monday, Nov. 3, against Bethune-Cookman at Neville Arena.
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This article originally appeared on Auburn Wire: Auburn basketball earns high preseason ranking from The Athletic
