Everything Auburn men’s basketball head coach Bruce Pearl said after a blowout loss at Kentucky

Saturday was a tough day at the office for Bruce Pearl and his Auburn men’s basketball team.

Pearl’s morbid pregame prediction that Auburn would lose by 40 if the Tigers didn’t rebound the ball well against Kentucky nearly came true: UK led by as many as 40 points late in the second half in a 86-54 blowout win over the Tigers.

Kentucky also outrebounded Auburn 41-23 in the game.

Auburn has now lost 20 straight games at Kentucky, a streak that dates back to 1988.

Afterward, Pearl met with the media inside Rupp Arena.

Here’s what he said:

Opening statement: So when I was at Southern Indiana coaching the Screaming Eagles for nine years, the two or three teams that mattered the most, on our schedule, were Kentucky Wesleyan in Owensboro, Northern Kentucky, just there in Covington, just across the bridge from Cincinnati, Bellarmine in Louisville. Because we took great pride in our basketball in Indiana and you all take great pride in your basketball in Kentucky.

I’ve come in here before and gotten smacked like that. And it’s embarrassing because you know good basketball and you know really bad basketball. You know, we were ready to play. You could tell early, we had a good game plan. And then with about three or four minutes left to go in the first half, things just unraveled a little bit. And then our guys just didn’t, we just didn’t stay together. You can’t have one assist in the first half and you’ve got to, offensively, try to work together to make each other better and we just didn’t.

And of course the same thing happened on the defensive end as well. So Auburn was not competitive at all tonight.

Q. Question about how Kentucky has changed from earlier in the season to now.

Yeah, well I mean they’re obviously really comfortable in their roles. Cason Wallace is a difference maker, you know, running point and, you know, his ability to defend and playmake and, you know, finish shots. You know, the Reeves kid is a great you know, obviously a great great shooter. Older player gives them...

And those guys need to be able to be aggressive to be able to make some mistakes and when you’re playing 35 minutes and you know they don’t have quite the depth. Guys are really comfortable in the roles. Tshiebwe’s playing dominant on the inside. We thought we could score on him a little bit and hurt him a little bit in the ball screen. But he did a nice job there and they just, him, Toppin, are physically just imposing out there and then the wings are so... Literally bigger and stronger at every position. And their physicality, we were no match for.

So yeah, they’re playing really well together.

Q. Question about how Auburn fell apart in the second half.

Haven’t seen it yet. But we saw it tonight. And so you know, nobody likes to come apart like that. This team’s kind of scrapped and clawed and, you know, we’ve been in every game on the road in tough places. And tonight, things came apart. If I had an explanation for why it wouldn’t have happened.

Q. Question about Kentucky’s Antonio Reeves scoring 18 points in the second half.

You know, I think that for the first, again, 15 minutes I thought we played pretty well defensively and transition hurt us throughout the last four minutes and then the entire second half. I thought one of the keys was their guards being able to get down hill. Their guards were able to get downhill on us and drive past our guards.

We couldn’t stay in front of them. And I thought it was a difference. Which then led to drive, draw, dish and led to inside out. Can’t keep in front. Can’t guard them.

Q. Question about how physicality and rebounding played a part in the game’s outcome.

Huge. It was huge. I was off by eight points. I hate when I’m right. But the physicality, they were much, much more physical than we were and played that way at both ends of the floor. You know, Tshiebwe’s the most physical player in the game. And you know, Toppin is big, strong bouncy physical. Their wings are big. Livingston’s toughening up a little bit and doesn’t play like a young player. Again, Reeves really helps them. Wallace is, I don’t know many freshman that are built like that. Great player. Great size. Great tempo. So physically it was a mismatch.

Q. Question about Johni Broome starting strong for Auburn, then not producing as much later in the game.

Well, I think when you only have one assist in the first half, it’s really hard to score many more buckets. You’ve got to get your big involved and we did not do a very good job getting him the ball like we did earlier in the game. Went away from it.

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