After coming off a big win against the Arkansas Razorbacks, the Auburn Tigers basketball team suffered an 84-74 loss to Missouri on the road Wednesday night. The Tigers fall to 10-7 overall and 1-3 in the conference.
In his post-game comments, first-year head coach Steven Pearl revealed that the team is struggling when it comes to leadership. The comments came after Pearl has said several times that they are having an issue with players being late to things.
"We probably lost this game before we even got here," Pearl said postgame on the Auburn Sports Network radio broadcast, per Auburn Undercover. "We didn't have great body language today at shootaround and in film. We've got to understand why that is. That has to be me, and I've got to do a better job of getting our guys into the right mindset. We need some leadership on this team to step up."
Pearl has had to adjust the lineup several times recently due to players being late, specifically removing Tahaad Pettiford from the starting lineup and keeping freshman Kaden Magwood out of the rotation for the past few games.
He went on to say that the team must put forth more effort if they want to win games.
"Yeah, we're not good enough to just show up," Pearl said. "We have to be excited to play every single night and play with the same effort and energy we did on Saturday against Arkansas. I don't know, we didn't have that same fire pregame in leading up to today. I thought we had a couple really good practices, but once we got here, I just didn't see the same intensity, the same focus, the same energy today leading up to the game that was needed to beat a really good Missouri team."
The Tigers return to action in Neville Arena on Saturday to host South Carolina at 5 p.m.