Auburn Basketball: Takeaways from Win Over Oklahoma in Sloppy Game
Here we look at some of the keys from the 74-70 win for Auburn basketball over Oklahoma on Wednesday night in Mohegan Sun Arena.
Auburn basketball won an ugly game over Oklahoma on Wednesday night at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Connecticut 74-70.
Even though Oklahoma is not the Final Four team they were a year ago, this is still a quality win for Auburn basketball, and their second quality win over a Big 12 opponent.
Auburn was actually up big early in this game thanks to some poor shooting by Oklahoma – or good defense by Auburn, however you want to look at it – but had to hang on down the stretch to win.
Here are some of my takeaways from the game:
Better Rebounding
It certainly was not a dominating performance by Auburn giving up 17 offensive rebounds, but Oklahoma did take a ton of shots and the Tigers came up with the majority of the misses – 37 to be exact.
I love how Danjel Purifoy, Mustapha Heron and T.J. Dunans attacked the rim and picked up a lot of rebounds in this game. We need a lot more of that going forward.
Turnover Issues
Whether it was traveling, double-dripples, carrying or just lack of concentration with the basketball, Auburn turned the ball over every way you can imagine.
They finished with 23 turnovers in the game, and Heron had seven himself – although he did have a game-high 4 steals. This is to be expected with a young team, but hopefully they can get it cleaned up.
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Ugly Game
This was not a particularly clean game for either team as Auburn turned the ball over a ton, and Oklahoma couldn’t make a shot.
On top of that, there were 52 fouls called in this game. It was just really hard for either team to get into any kind of flow in this game. To Auburn’s credit, they weathered the storm and remained focused.
Dunans Stays Hot
Following up his game-winning shot again Mercer, Dunans went for 21 points, 4 rebounds and 5 assists as an encore on his birthday. He also put the game away with a monster slam that should be on Top 10 tonight.
Harper Takes Control
When this game got close late, Bruce Pearl was looking for anyone to step up and put it away. Purifoy was in foul trouble the entire game, so he was pretty much a non-factor again.
It was Jared Harper who took control of this game down the stretch for Auburn and shut the door on any Oklahoma comeback. He finished with a game-high 21 points – along with Dunans – and was clutch at the free throw line hitting 11-of-12 from the stripe.
