GREENVILLE, S.C. – Auburn rallied from an 18-point third-quarter deficit to retake the lead midway through the fourth quarter, but a late Florida run ended the Tigers' comeback hopes in a 69-62 loss Wednesday in the first round of the SEC Tournament.
"They continued to play hard," Auburn head coach Terri Williams-Flournoy said. "When we got the lead, when we lost the lead, when we got down, they just continued to fight. They just kept fighting. We had some good shots, some shots that we needed to knock down. We needed Unique to throw it out a little more because half the time she had the whole (Florida) team on her. And when she does kick it out, we've got to be able to knock down those shots.
The Tigers used a 23-2 run over a five-and-a-half minute stretch spanning the end of the third and start of the fourth quarter to turn a 52-34 deficit into a 57-54 lead. But the Gators answered with a 12-0 run of their own, and Auburn made just one field goal the rest of the way.
"(The message was) to just keep our heads up," Williams-Flournoy said of the third-quarter deficit. "And let our defense dictate what we do next. And we did. The 3s by number 10 (UF's Danielle Rainey) really hurt us. That was the dagger. We were making a run at that point."
Alaina Rice led the Tigers offensively for the second straight game with 15 points, a season-high for the sophomore guard. She also had four rebounds and a pair of assists. Honesty Scott-Grayson, despite missing a big chunk of the first half after taking a shot to the face while diving for a loose ball, finished with 12 points and a team-leading three assists.
Senior Unique Thompson put a bow on her senior season with 14 points and 10 rebounds for her 58th career double-double, extending her all-time Auburn record and moving into a tie for seventh place in SEC history in career double-doubles. Eight of her 14 points came during Auburn's big run to take the lead early in the fourth quarter.
As a team, Auburn shot 35 percent (24-68) from the field and was 7-of-8 at the free-throw line. Both teams were 7-of-20 (35%) from 3-point range. The Tigers forced Florida into 17 turnovers, converting those into 19 points, but Florida out-rebounded Auburn 39-32 on the day.
A back-and-forth first quarter ended with a 16-16 tie through 10 minutes. After an Annie Hughes 3-pointer opened the scoring in the second, the Gators went on a 10-2 run over the next five minutes to take a 26-21 lead. Auburn answered with a 9-2 run of its own, moving ahead 30-28 on an Alycia Reese trey. A pair of Gator buckets and two Reese free throws later, Florida led 33-32 at the break.
The first six minutes of the third quarter were a nightmare as Auburn missed 11 straight shots before a Scott-Grayson layup with 4:20 left broke the streak. In the meantime, Florida hit five of its first six attempts of the quarter and broke out to a 52-34 lead with 2:25 to play. But the Tigers' defense stood tall, getting stops and forcing turnovers to end the quarter on a 12-0 run over the final 2:08, cutting it to just a six-point game after three.
Auburn's hot streak continued early in the fourth as they answered a quick Florida bucket with another 11-0 run, taking a 55-54 lead on an Aicha Coulibaly layup with 7:28 to play. A Scott-Grayson layup put the Tigers up by three, but three straight 3-pointers by the Gators sparked a 12-0 Florida run that put the game out of reach. The Tigers would make just one field goal over the final six-plus minutes, missing eight of their final nine shots.
Thompson finishes her senior season with 1,540 points and 1,156 rebounds; she's the 12th-leading scorer in Auburn history and the all-time leader in rebounds, rebounding average (10.6) and double-doubles. She is also 10th in career field goals made (605) and eighth in career free throws (329).
"She's been amazing," Williams-Flournoy said of Thompson. "She's been an amazing player for four years. You've seen her development from freshman year to senior year. She's going in the record books, a record that's going to be a very long time before it's broken. You saw how long it took her to break the all-time rebounding record.
"She's going to go down as one of the best players to have played in an Auburn jersey. She gives it all. Just to have watched her maturity and growth over the four years has been great."
Tigers' comeback bid falls short in SEC Tournament
