Auburn players discuss the start of the NCAA Tournament
Winning the SEC Regular Season Championship and getting the top overall seed for the NCAA Tournament are great accomplishments. With that said, the Auburn Tigers know this team will be judged on what they do in March. After losing three of four games, there needs to be a sense of urgency for Auburn.
Johni Broome, Denver Jones, and Chad Baker-Mazara all spoke to the media on Wednesday ahead of Thursday's tournament action. Jones says that he is ready to hit the court.
'I feel like we are more motivated now as far as taking it one game at a time, and obviously we are trying to win that game and get to Sunday -- Saturday, sorry about that,' Jones said.
Jones added more when asked about being the number one seed despite losing in the SEC Tournament semifinals.
'I just know that when we ended up losing the SEC tournament, we ended up losing three of our last four games, I feel like we're just a little extra motivated going into March Madness,' Jones said.
Auburn has not made it past the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament since the 2019 Final Four run. The 2022 team led by Jabari Smith was upset by No. 10 seed Miami in the second round, and last year was upset by No. 13 seed Yale. The positive of losing on Saturday to the Volunteers was that it gave the Tigers some extra preparation time.
'Practice has been a little bit ramped up. We had an extra day of rest because we didn't play on Sunday. So we got to work on ourselves and just trying to find our identity again', Broome said.
Auburn knows what can happen in March. 'This tournament is March, so anybody can really beat anybody if you don't come focused and locked in and take people for granted,' Baker-Mazara said. 'So we gotta make sure we come in tomorrow and take care of our business.'
Alabama State is a guard-heavy team led by CJ Hines and Amarr Knox both averaging a little over 14 points per game. The Tigers have struggled with rebounding when met with physical teams that have size. Auburn should win by a large margin, but the focus needs to be there to not take these Hornets lightly.
The game will be televised by CBS and has an approximate tip-off time of 1:50 p.m. CT.
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