Auburn Scores Fewest Points this Season and Falls to Tennessee 71-45

Auburn just couldn’t get shots to fall, and they have their third straight game with a season-low shooting percentage. Auburn (9-14, 3-8) shot just 23.7 percent from the field on their way to only scoring 45 points in the road loss to Tennessee (12-12, 5-6) as the Volunteers evened up the season series.

The Tigers played their second game without Kareem Canty and the scoring issues were even more apparent this time around. Cinmeon Bowers and Tyler Harris were extremely ineffective down low, while TJ Lang and Jordon Granger couldn’t get shots to fall on the outside either.

Tyler Harris was 0-10 from the floor and only had 2 points on two free throws before leaving the game early with an apparent back injury. Hopefully this is nothing major, otherwise Auburn suffers yet another significant injury this season.

After a decent showing at point guard against Georgia, Cinmeon Bowers took quite a step back against Tennessee. Bowers still only had 1 assist on his stat sheet and also racked up 6 turnovers, while no one else on the team had more than one. Bowers was 1-8 at the free throw line for an awful performance, even by his standards. At least the big point guard was still able to pull down 15 rebounds.

Rebounding ended up being one of the only categories that Auburn kept close to Tennessee. Auburn had 44 rebounds as a team, while Tennessee pulled down 48. This is mostly due to the poor shooting from both teams instead of Auburn playing well. It’s really hard to find positives in this game, so if I have to look really hard, rebounds appear to be the only thing close to positive for Auburn.

Bryce Brown was also a small bright spot as the freshman guard had another big game against Tennessee. This time Brown finished 4-8 from deep and totaled 18 points with just one foul this time. Brown had four of Auburn’s five made threes on the night when the team took 26 total.New Williams had the only other three-pointer.

As if 23.7 percent from the field wasn’t bad enough, Auburn shot under 20 percent from deep and an even 50 percent at the free throw line. Scoring was extremely difficult for the Tigers all night long and the win seemed highly improbable shortly into the second half.

While the offense continued to struggle without Kareem Canty and the other missing players, the defense can hang their hats on containing Kevin Punter and Armani Moore at least. Punter and Moore finished with a combined 6 points, but Tennessee was still able to score 71 points and get the 26 point victory.

This isn’t the first time that Auburn has been able to contain a star for a team, but like previous times, they let other players have great games instead. Tonight junior guard Robert Hubbs III was able to explode for a game-leading 20 points.

Losses keep piling up and wins seem less and less likely from this point on. Shooting is a huge concern for Auburn, and if they can’t start knocking down shots they don’t stand a chance against the rest of the teams on their schedule. Auburn has lost every game on the road in the SEC and now has six total losses in a row.

This season just needs to be over so that Auburn can fully start focusing on next season. It’s sad how low this season has gone after having a decent chance of making the post season if all of the injuries and off-the-court issues hadn’t occurred like they have.