Here are the biggest takeaways from the past week in NCAA basketball, including a look at Auburn’s bad week, Dayton’s unsung hero, and more.
Normally we don’t see the mass amount of upsets across the NCAA Basketball landscape until February and March, but this is anything but a normal season.
Five top 10 teams lost this week to unranked foes, and the top five teams combined for six losses, the most in a week in nearly three decades. That’s because three of those top five teams lost twice (Auburn, Butler, Duke), and that stretch has raised serious concerns about the Tigers in particular.
Here are the biggest takeaways from the past week in college basketball in a new Rauf Report, starting with Auburn’s weaknesses being exposed this week.
1) Auburn was exposed
Coming into the week, Auburn had risen to No. 4 in the country and hadn’t lost a game, yet no one really knew how good they were because they hadn’t been tested by a ranked team or in a tough road game.
We knew we would find out more about the Tigers this week with road contests against Auburn and Florida on the schedule and, well, what we learned wasn’t good.
Auburn excels when they’re able to get out in transition and use their athleticism advantage. They still take a lot of threes and, while they struggle to make their perimeter shots (30.9 percent on the season), the fact they shoot so many forces defenses to defend them out there, opening up driving lanes for their athletes in turn.
This week, we learned that is all they have in their arsenal.
Against a team just as athletic as they are (or at least close to as athletic) in Alabama, the Tigers turned the ball over 21 times, committed, 35 fouls, and only shot 25 percent from three-point range.
Against a team that was able to slow the pace down in Florida, Auburn had their worst shooting performance (25.5 percent from the field, including 17.4 percent from three) and lowest-scoring outing (47 points) of the season. The Gators made them play in the halfcourt and execute their offensive sets, and Auburn’s offense completely stalled out.
The Tigers will improve, yet this week they showed why some had concerns about them in the preseason. Right now, if they don’t have the athleticism advantage and/or are forced to play at a slower pace than normal, Auburn is ineffective.