The Auburn basketball team's first opponent in this year's March Madness tournament was decided in a First Four game on Tuesday night. The Alabama State Hornets and the Saint Francis Red Flash faced off in an action-packed game in Dayton, Ohio.
It was a fight to the finish, but the Hornets ultimately won with a Hail Mary heave to inbound the ball and a layup by Amarr Knox at the buzzer for a 70-68 final score. It was Alabama State's first-ever NCAA Tournament win, and they will head to Lexington to take on the No. 1 Auburn Tigers.
"These guys are amazing. Each and every day they come in and work, no matter if we are up or down. They find a way to help us win this game," Knox said Tuesday, before looking ahead to facing the Tigers, per USA Today. "We are going to try to get the win."
Alabama State's campus sits just 52 miles away from Auburn University. The two basketball teams have met six times previously, the most recent in Auburn on December 22, 2023, when the Tigers won 82-62. The Hornets have won only one of the six matchups, in 2013.
It's been a historic season for the Auburn basketball team, and they will try to continue to make history as the No. 1 overall seed and win Auburn's first national championship in basketball.
“It allows us to be able to say that our goal is to win the national championship. It allows us to say that if we don’t win the national championship, we’ll be disappointed as a number one seed,” Pearl said earlier this week, per Auburn Live.
The Tigers' 2025 March Madness run will begin this Thursday at 1:50 p.m. against Alabama State in Lexington, Kentucky. The game will be broadcast on CBS.