Auburn basketball suffered a brutal home loss to Ole Miss on Saturday night, 85-79, ending the Tigers' 10-game winning streak over the Rebels.
With the loss, Auburn dropped to 15-14 on the season as it now must win out, which may not be enough, in hopes of an NCAA Tournament berth.
Here are the biggest takeaways from the game:
Auburn (nearly) wins the first 20
The Tigers' streak of trailing at the half grew to six games on Saturday against Ole Miss, as the Rebels closed the half on an 8-0 run, connecting on their last six shots while Auburn was scoreless for the last 2:23.
Auburn kept things close for the majority of the half as Ole Miss, which entered with an average of 7.25 made threes per game, buried five to get ahead by as many as six.
The Tigers then used a 14-2 run, ignited by their first triple of the game from Kevin Overton, to take control as Ole Miss missed its next five triples.
Auburn displayed a new starting lineup with Filip Jovic replacing KeShawn Murphy and Elyjah Freeman for Sebastian Williams-Adams. During the Tigers' 14-2 run, the new starters sparked some life and tallied nine straight points.
But the Rebels capitalized on a cold-shooting stretch from Auburn to regain the lead for a 38-37 edge at the break.
Ole Miss controls second half after quick Auburn burst
Auburn began the second half on an 11-2 run, ignited by a pair of triples from Overton and Freeman, taking control with an eight-point lead.
Then, Ole Miss answered.
The Rebels used a 21-5 overall run over the next 10 minutes of play, pushing ahead by 12 points with under eight minutes to go.
Auburn answered with an extended 14-4 run to cut its deficit to two with 3:20 remaining, but Ole Miss buried its ninth triple of the contest and won a back-and-forth few minutes to close things out.
The Rebels shot 49% from the floor in the second half, connected on five threes and only committed three turnovers.
Speaking of turnovers
For the third consecutive game, Auburn left with double-digit turnovers, marking the 17th time this season it has done so.
After a handful of sloppy mistakes in the first half, the Tigers committed seven turnovers in the second half en route to a 14-turnover performance
Ole Miss turned the Tigers’ miscues into 18 points on the other end as every Auburn player that saw action – excluding Jovic – committed a turnover, with all but three committing multiple.
Storr, Pinkins light it up
Saturday night marked yet another instance in which Auburn allowed a 20-point scorer.
Only this time, it allowed multiple.
Patton Pinkins, who entered the night averaging 8.8 points per game, lit the Tigers up for 26 points as his counterpart, AJ Storr, matched him to combine for 52 of the Rebels' total points.
Pinkins connected on four treys with a 6-of-7 mark from the charity stripe as Storr was 9-of-15 from the field with six made free throws.
Tahaad Pettiford snapped out of his recent funk with 24 points on a 10-of-16 clip from the field to lead all Tigers. Keyshawn Hall, who finished the night with a minus-11 mark on the night, tallied 21 points.
Saturday marked the first time since January 14 that Ole Miss has scored more than 90 points in regulation – two games before its 10-game skid.
Auburn will remain at home for a Wednesday night tilt with LSU at 9 p.m. on SECN.
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