Bruce Pearl says Auburn won game for Charles Barkley

San Diego isn’t a bad place to unwind. As for Clemson, they’ve had some duds on the scoreboard here and there, but really just obliterated Auburn.

Charleston is shooting 40.7 percent and has rallied from an early deficit. The inexperience of Auburn was more evident in their game than that of Clemson in their victory, but there is no telling how these two teams will match up. “So, we’ll be pulling for them to keep going”, said Auburn fan Leslie Oakley. Mustapha Heron was Auburn’s high scorer with 16 points on 6-for-15 shooting. Brown shot 4 for 13 from the field and 3 for 9 from beyond the arc.

Entering the NCAA Tournament, Auburn was tied for the SEC lead with 15.4 turnovers forced per game and tied for second in the conference with a plus-3.2 turnover margin. “They were out-sized from the opening tip, starting only one player (Horace Spencer) who was over 6’5”.

In a matchup between Southern schools better known for football – Clemson won the national championship two seasons ago – the No. 5 seed Clemson Tigers proved far more adept on the hardwood than the No. 4 seed Auburn Tigers.

“(Junior guard Bryce Brown) challenged the shot”, Pearl said. There wasn’t anybody else out there that was confident shooting the basketball. “As a result, we had a much better year”.

Clemson’s defense played some part in that. To make it to the Sweet 16, Auburn needs to take advantage of every free throw opportunity because those missed points could make the difference in a close game. KenPom had the ACC’s Tigers as a top-10 defensive team nationally.

The officials didn’t catch it – neither did Charleston players or coaches – and Harper made one of two attempts to put the game out of reach.

“We played really, really well, obviously”, Clemson coach Brad Brownell said in a postgame interview on TBS.

That’s why the mood was so somber inside Auburn’s locker room, at least in the first few minutes after the game ended. “It has not helped us be very cohesive, offensively”.

Auburn shooting guard Bryce Brown never got into a rhythm that defined his regular season for the Tigers.

Since forward Donte Grantham went down on January 20 to a knee injury, Clemson has been a totally different basketball team. “We’ll practice Thursday in Omaha and be ready to play Friday”, Self said Sunday night in a release.

They are headed for the Sweet 16, and after what they’ve done the first two weekends of the tournament, there’s no reason to think that they won’t give No. 1-seed Kansas a fight when they get there. “We have a special group of guys, not only for this year but for next year and the year after that”.