It’s here boys and girls. The return of basketball season. Bruce Pearl and co. are ready to open the regular season after taking care of Eckard (or however you spell it) in an exhibition game last week. The road to ATL starts tomorrow.
THE OPPONENT:
Georgia Southern Eagles
Sun Belt Conference
2018-2019 Record: 21-12
Kenpom ranking entering 2019-2020: 126
Projected #2 seed in the Sunbelt
BREAKING DOWN THE EAGLES:
Georgia Southern is coming into this season with a similar predicament as our Auburn Tigers. They are tasked with replacing their leader on both sides of the court. Tookie Brown was a 4x All Sunbelt player who lead the conference in scoring. He is gone. This is good news for Auburn. However the Eagles are still returning three potent starters.
Quan Jackson is a 6’4 180 pound 2 guard who will start alongside Ike Smith at the 3. Smith is along the same build but a little heavier than Jackson at 6’4 210. Smith is coming off a back injury that caused him to miss most of the 2018-2019 season, but the Eagles are going to rely heavily on him to carry the load on offense. In 15 games last season Smith averaged 5.7 boards and 14.7 ppg, but only shooting 25% from 3. Jackson started every game for the Eagles and averaged 4.5 boards and 14.8 ppg while knocking down 33% of his three point attempts. I expect Okoro to be locked up with Smith all night, and Samir matches up nicely with Quan Jackson.
Tookie Brown was the PG for the Eagles last season, but stepping into the role will now be David Lee Jones Jr. 6’0 175. He played in every game last season while spelling Brown and averaged 7.8 ppg, 2 boards and dishing out 1.8 assists. He was also the teams best shooter from outside, knocking down 40% of his tries from three. This will be a battle of the two new starters for their respective teams, but I fully expect J’von to have the clear advantage.
At the forward spot the returning starter for Ga. Southern is 6’7 210 pound Isaiah Crawley. Crawled started every game at the 4 last season and averaged 5.5 boards and 11.6 ppg. He doesn’t shoot much from outside, attempting only 53 shots from beyond the arc, and boasts a mere 28% accuracy from distance. He’ll play closer to the bucket, so we’ll have a nice opportunity to see how Purifoy holds up playing defense near the basket. Crawley won’t be much of a threat to extend the defense, so Danjel won’t be asked to step out and guard from distance as we will see more once we get into SEC play with much more athletic guys at the 4 spot.
The Center position is going to give the Eagles fits tomorrow. I feel pretty confident in that given that they’re replacing their starting C with a PF who did not play much C last year. Trey Dawkins is the only C listed on the team’s depth chart, and was listed as the 3rd string PF/C last year. They lost starter Montae Glenn to graduation and backup C Tyshaun Crawford to transfer. It’ll be interesting to see if they decide to roll with another forward at C in place of Dawkins, but that would be good news for Auburn seeing as Dawkins is their tallest player at 6’9 but only weighing in at 200 pounds. It’s also possible that Crawley could slide from the 4 down to the 5 and Iowa State transfer Simeon Carter could start at the 4 in his place. I expect Austin Wiley and Ant to feast down low. A double double from Wiley shouldn’t be out of the question if he can stay out of foul trouble.
MATCHUP TO WATCH:
Auburn Centers v. GA Southern Centers
As stated above, I believe Austin and Ant will have a coming out party in game number one. The Eagles are small and skinny, and as we’ve seen, Austin Wiley is neither of those things. He should be able to have his way down low, which will in return give our guards great looks from outside. Points will come in the paint early, and then I expect us to heat up from three as the game goes on.
PREDICTION:
Auburn is returning a lot of talent as well as mixing in a lot of young guys who will be expected to contribute. I think Auburn will have some growing pains this year, don’t get me wrong, but I think game one in front of a packed Auburn Arena the Tigers will show out and play true Bruce Pearl type basketball.
Tigers - 88
Eagles - 68
