Auburn basketball used a second-half surge and a stellar night at the charity stripe on Tuesday against Ole Miss to pick up its first true road win of the season 78-66.
With the win, Auburn extended its win streak over the Rebels to 10, tying South Carolina as its longest active win streak in the conference.
Here are the biggest takeaways from the game:
Tigers’ 3-point shooting woes continue
After an abysmal showing from beyond the arc in its last game against South Carolina, Auburn’s recent trend of struggling from deep continued against the Rebels.
Hitting just 2-of-19 from deep against the Gamecocks last week – which was its worst mark of the season from three – Auburn converted just 2-of-17 3-pointers on Tuesday. For those counting, that’s a 4-of-36 mark in the last 80 minutes of Auburn basketball.
The Tigers were provided plenty of open looks, as Ole Miss came into this one ranked 12th in the SEC in 3-point percentage defense, but could not convert on many of them.
Tahaad Pettiford buried one on five attempts, and Sebastian Williams-Adams netted the other on two attempts.
Meanwhile, Ole Miss connected on 10-of-24 from three, giving it a plus-24 advantage from deep.
Defense does its job
Though it wasn’t the prettiest night on the offensive end of the floor for Auburn, its defense lived up to the Steven Pearl standard, holding Ole Miss to just 36% from the floor and 10 points below its per-game average.
Sure, the Tigers would have liked to defend the 3-point line better, but Malik Dia, the Rebels’ leading scorer coming into this one, was held to just two points on a 1-of-3 clip.
AJ Storr, who was averaging 23.3 ppg during the Rebels’ three-game win streak, notched 18 points, but Auburn held Ole Miss to 14 points in the paint, six in transition, while blocking four shots with five steals.
Murph’s double-double
Throughout the uncertainty on Tuesday night’s game for Auburn, one thing was apparent from the start: KeShawn Murphy was going to feast.
The 6-foot-10 Birmingham, AL, native recorded his second double-double of the season – and second in four games – against the Rebels with 16 points and 14 rebounds. He was 5-of-8 from the floor and 6-of-7 from the free-throw line.
He fueled the Tigers' rebounding efforts, as Auburn owned a 42-26 advantage on the boards.
Auburn found a way to score
Pettiford returned to his ways of old on the road down the stretch to turn in 17 points. Keyshawn Hall recorded a quiet game-high 19 points with 12 in the second half. And Williams-Adams (along with Murphy) reached double figures with 10 points.
But it was the Tigers’ free-throw shooting that made the difference.
Coming into this one, Auburn ranked No. 4 nationally in free throw attempts per game, and tied a season-high with 39 attempts against the Rebels. It netted 32, marking a new season-high.
Conversely, Ole Miss shot just 15 free throws and made 12.
Auburn will travel to the Stephen C. O'Connell Center on Saturday to take on No. 16 Florida. Tipoff is set for 3 p.m. on ESPN.
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