AUBURN, Ala. – Auburn rallied late but fell short to No. 19 Vanderbilt, losing 84-76 Tuesday at Neville Arena on a frustrating night for the home team.
“Credit to Vanderbilt. They did a great job. Played really well early tonight,” Auburn coach Steven Pearl said. “We had a great environment tonight again. I want to continue to thank our fans for hanging in there with this team as we’re trying to work through some things. They did their part, we didn’t do ours. For that, I apologize. I’ve got to do a better job as their coach in these situations.”
Tahaad Pettiford paced all five Tiger starters in double figures with 21 points and four assists.
“He really battled tonight,” Pearl said. “He put in a great effort. That’s something we’re going to need from him moving forward. He did our best job of getting downhill and finishing at the rim.”
Keyhawn Hall scored 13, KeShawn Murphy added a dozen, Sebastian Williams-Adams scored 11 and Kevin Overton chipped in 10.
Elyjah Freeman grabbed a game-high eight rebounds off the bench to help Auburn outrebound Vanderbilt by nine (36-27).
Trailing by 11 after leading for only 20 seconds in the first half, Auburn fell behind by 15 five minutes into the second half before Hall hit his third 3-pointer.
Murphy made a steal and drove coast to coast for a lay-in in a 6-0 Auburn run that cut Vanderbilt’s lead to single digits, putting a charge into the home crowd.
Vanderbilt (20-4, 7-4) missed its first seven 3-point attempts of the second half before leading scorer Tyler Tanner made his only 3-pointer to put the Commodores on top by 11.
Down 14 with 6:14 to play, Auburn scored eight unanswered points to pull within six on Murphy’s pass to Overton for a reverse layup.
Needing a stop to potentially cut further into the deficit, Auburn forced a missed shot, but Vanderbilt’s Jalen Washington, who scored 22 points, got an offensive rebound and putback to lead 70-62 with 3:43 to play.
Auburn made one more push, getting back-to-back layups from Williams-Adams and Pettiford while making five straight field goals to pull within four points with 2:42 remaining.
“The last eight minutes, the group we had out there did a great job of fighting back,” Pearl said. “(Vanderbilt) did a great job executing down the stretch. Another disappointing result.”
Tanner, who scored a game-high 25 points, drew a foul when Auburn pressed, then after the Tigers missed a jump shot, Vanderbilt’s AK Okereke hit a 3-pointer from the corner at the 1:48 mark, and the Commodores made nine free throws the rest of the way to close out the road win.
“It’s such an incredible environment and a hard place to play,” said Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington, whose team made 22 of 25 free throws in the second half. “To be able to win here, I’m really proud of the guys. That Auburn team is difficult to stop and they have so many threats. In this building, they play at a high level. We knew Auburn was going to fight back. We wanted to take away the uncontested layup.”
Midway through the first half, Hall hit a pair of 3-pointers, then made two free throws to give Auburn its only lead of the game.
“I thought we should have gotten to the foul line more in the first half, based on how aggressive we were attacking downhill,” Pearl said.
After Overton tied the score at 26-26 with 6:03 to play, Vanderbilt outscored Auburn 16-5 down the stretch to take a 42-31 halftime lead.
Vanderbilt forwards Devin McGlockton and Washington each scored 12 points in the half, combining to make 8 of 9 field goals including 4-for-4 on 3-point attempts to help the Commodores take a 42-31 halftime lead.
“My big guys played really well today,” Byington said. “Those guys stepped up.”
Seeking to sweep the season series while ending a three-game losing streak, Auburn (14-10, 5-6) plays at No. 21 Arkansas Saturday at 7:30 p.m. CT on ESPN and the Auburn Sports Network from Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville.
The Tigers return to Neville Arena for the AUTLIVE Cancer game Saturday, Feb. 21 vs. Kentucky at 7:30 p.m. CT with free AUTLIVE t-shirts for Auburn University students.
“We continue to have great opportunities in front of us,” Pearl said. “We’ve got to find a way to improve. While the results haven’t been there, this team continues to get better. We’ve got to trust what we’re doing but we’ve also got to tweak things we’re doing defensively.
“We’ve got to find a way to steal a couple on the road and then try to protect home court later in the season. The only way we’re going to do that is if we refocus and come back ready to go (at practice) on Thursday.”
Jeff Shearer is a Senior Writer at AuburnTigers.com. Follow him on X: @jeff_shearer