What Auburn said after losing to the Gators

When Auburn took a 46-38 lead into the half after a strong opening 20 minutes, the Tigers had to feel confident. But when the team’s national semifinal vs. Florida on Saturday was over, it had fallen to the Gators 79-73. The Tigers were both stunned and disappointed afterward, which is understandable. Auburn was the top overall seed in the NCAA Tournament. But now Florida is moving on to the championship game and the Tigers are headed home. Following the loss, Auburn coach Bruce Pearl and a few players spoke to the media. Here’s what they had to say.

-Pearl’s opening post-game remarks: “I want to start off by congratulating Florida on their victory. Wish them luck in the championship game. I’m really proud of my team, how these guys made history, the best basketball team in the history of Auburn basketball. They gave us a ride that won’t ever be forgotten. They did so many great things both on and off the court that I’m extremely proud of.

Played beautiful basketball in the first half. We were prepared. We had a great game plan. They executed it really well. We only turned the ball over twice. Second half, Florida’s effort and energy, the fact that we’re not as deep as what we normally are, was a factor. I thought fatigue was a factor. As a result, we weren’t able to maintain control of the game, which I think if we had taken care of the basketball a little bit, not turned it over, not given them easy ones, we could have been in position to win the basketball game.”

CONTEXT: Auburn committed two turnovers in the first half and 12 in the final 20 minutes.

-Tigers guard Denver Jones on the challenge of defending All-American Florida guard Walter Clayton: “Doing a lot of dribble handoffs, a lot of actions just run through him. Just constantly moving. I feel like that is just what gave (him) some of the looks he had tonight. Just a lot of hand-offs, a lot of drives. That’s what it was.”

CONTEXT: Clayton finished with a game-high 34 points, including 20 in the second half.

-Auburn center/forward Johni Broome on his injured elbow: “Me elbow felt fine going into the game. Obviously here and there it bothered me a little bit. But, I mean, nothing that I couldn’t play with. I feel like we got the looks that we wanted to get. I wasn’t able to capitalize and finish ’em.”

CONTEXT: Broome, the SEC Player of the Year, had 12 points, 4 rebounds and 2 blocks at the break. But he was shut down in the final 20 minutes and finished the game with 15 points.

-Pearl on Clayton: ” Well, he’s a great player. He can go both ways. He can make tough shots. About the only thing, again, I probably should have done more is trap the ball out of his hands a little bit. Believe it or not, that was part of our game plan, but we just didn’t execute it. Like just sort of you say all things are kind of equal. Clayton was the difference. He was just flat out the difference. We couldn’t contain him down that end.”

CONTEXT: Clayton became the first player in college hoops since Larry Bird in 1979 to score 30-plus points in both the Elite Eight and Final Four.

-Pearl on Auburn’s lack of depth and Florida coming through on the defensive end in the second half: “We got down to seven guys. That’s not enough. We just did not have enough help off the bench. I think to take a little heat off of Johni, we scored great in the first half with our two-point baskets. We went through him, and he did great. I don’t know whether we got away from it a little bit, but we only had a handful of two-point baskets in the second half. I’m going to give Florida credit defensively for stepping up.”

CONTEXT: Auburn shot 51 percent in the first half but ended the game only 25 of 57 (43.9 percent) from the field. The Tigers were only 7 of 25 from 3-point range.