When Auburn signed Keyshawn Hall out of the transfer portal this offseason, they knew they were getting a pure scorer. Last year at UCF, he averaged 18.8 points per game, earning a spot on the All-Big 12 Second Team.
Through two games with the Tigers, he's proven to be exactly that, putting up 28 points in the opener against Bethune-Cookman. On Thursday night, he led Auburn with 25 points in a 95-57 victory over Merrimack.
When asked about his mindset on the floor, Hall had a simple answer.
“Score," he said. "That’s all I think. Since I was a kid, I’ve been naturally a scorer. I can be versatile. This game I started at three. I can start any position that they need me to, but I started the three. I could start the four. I just play how they want me to play."
While the scoring has been there, the 6-foot-7 senior came down with just five rebounds in the win on Monday. While watching tape of Merrimack, Hall noticed that the Warriors lacked size, so he made it a mission to dominate the boards. The result was 14 rebounds for Hall, who recorded his first double-double in an Auburn uniform.
"They’re a good team, but they were little," Hall said. "So we can crash and get a lot of offensive rebounds. If you want to score the ball, how about you go rebound the ball? That was a big thing IB (Ira Bowman) and coach (Corey) Williams were saying that we knew we had to check out because all the upcoming teams on our schedule are way bigger. If we can’t check them out and rebound, we’re going to have a problem.”
As he transitions from UCF to Auburn, Hall has found that the game comes a little easier to him with all the talent around him.
“It was a great year at UCF," he said. "They put me in a lot of great positions to give me the ball. Here at Auburn, I don’t think I have to try as much. I don’t think I have to iso as much. They run plays for me to be wide open or for me to get downhill and things like that. Both coaches let me play freely, but here, they let me get open, and they find me a little more here."