Auburn basketball passed their first test of the NCAA tournament with flying colors. Big man Walker Kessler nearly put up his third triple-double of the season, K.D. Johnson victoriously bounced back from is 0-14 game in the SEC Tournament, and Jabari Smith was, well, Jabari Smith.
The potential first-round pick in the 2022 NBA Draft pulled out all the stops against the Jacksonville State Gamecocks, leading the team with 20 points, 14 rebounds, four assists while shooting at 46.2 percent from the field and 57.1 percent from behind the arc.
Although the Tigers may have gotten off to a slow start against the Gamecocks, they ultimately came back strong and gave Jacksonville State no chance at pulling off the upset.
Rounding out what was already a dominant game for the six-time SEC Freshman of the Week and ultimate SEC Freshman of the Year was Jabari Smith’s insane dunk in the final minutes of the game:
JABARI SMITH FOR THE LOVE OF ELEVATION pic.twitter.com/IXlERkfByy
— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) March 18, 2022
a play in four acts pic.twitter.com/JR2gm3lsBy
— FanSided (@FanSided) March 18, 2022
Jabari Smith put him on a poster for the rest of time @WarDamnStool
— Barstool Sports (@barstoolsports) March 18, 2022
pic.twitter.com/6yJibGWvUR
When asked at the end of the game about his teammate’s posterization of Jacksonville State big man Brandon Huffman, Walker Kessler and Tigers’ head coach Bruce Pearl were both speechless.
But this is what it’s all about for the Auburn basketball team in the year 2022. So they had a rough showing in the SEC Tournament in Tampa, so the offense has been a little off lately, so what?
Walker Kessler is the SEC Defensive Player of the Year, Jabari Smith is the SEC Freshman of the Year, and Bruce Pearl is the SEC Coach of the Year. What did you expect from these guys? If they manage to play the rest of the tournament as cohesive as they played in this game, you can expect the Tigers to go on a deep run throughout March Madness.