Auburn basketball opens its run in the NCAA Tournament Thursday with Alabama State. Will they cruise to victory?
The regular season and SEC Tournament are now in the rear-view mirror for the Auburn Tigers. The new season begins on Thursday with the first round of the Men’s NCAA Tournament when Auburn plays the Alabama State Hornets in Lexington, Kentucky as part of the south region. Alabama State defeated St. Francis (PA) 70-68. Amarr Knox made a layup with one second remaining to give the Hornets the win.
The ESPN Matchup Predictor has the Tigers with a 99% chance of winning the game and advancing to a second-round game to play either Louisville or Creighton. Auburn defeated Alabama State last season 82-62 in an early season game at Neville Arena.
“We played them last year, and they had a pretty good team. So we can’t take nobody for granted”, Chad Baker Mazara said when speaking to the media on Wednesday.
Auburn forward Johni Broome said that the team quickly got to work on preparation for the Hornets following Tuesday’s First Four game.
“We did watch them live last night. It was in the team room watching the game. Crazy ending.” Broome said, “And after that we kinda started scouting them, watching film on them and getting prepared on how we want to guard them and their tendencies.”
Last season Broome had 16 points and 13 rebounds against the Hornets.
BetMGM has the Tigers as a 32.5-point favorite in the game. Auburn needs to get the momentum back they had before losing three of the last four games. They should win the game, but how they look doing it will be the story. The game can be seen on CBS with a tip-off time of approximately 1:50 p.m. CT.
