Auburn rallies late, falls in OT at No. 23 Georgia in SEC opener

ATHENS, Ga. – If the rest of the SEC season is anything like Auburn’s conference opener, Tiger fans are in for a wild ride.

Auburn scored four points in the final second of regulation to force overtime before falling to No. 23 Georgia 104-100 Saturday at Stegeman Coliseum in the Tigers’ SEC opener.
 
“Disappointing result,” Auburn coach Steven Pearl said. “It’s hard to win on the road but we put ourselves in positions in a lot of ways to win this game against a ranked opponent. Just came up short.”

With Auburn trailing 92-88 after a Georgia dunk with five seconds to play, Keyshawn Hall drew a foul while attempting a 3-pointer with .7 on the clock.

After making the first two free throws, Hall intentionally missed the third, which Kevin Overton rebounded before swishing home a 10-foot baseline jumper at the buzzer to send the game to overtime tied 92-92, a stunning sequence for the visitors. 

“This is the first time we showed ourselves that if you just keep playing, you’ll be okay, no matter the score,” Overton said. “It shows that we have fight. It gives me hope that we have a chance to do something special.” 

Overton came up big again in OT, evening the score with a layup after Georgia scored first, then hitting a 3-pointer that gave Auburn a 97-95 lead with 3:57 to play. 

After Elyjah Freeman made a free throw to put the Tigers up three with 2:56 remaining, Georgia claimed momentum with a 7-0 run that featured two 3-pointers by Jeremiah Wilkinson, the game’s leading scorer with 31 points.

“You’ve got to have a little bit of pride in not letting those guards go for 31 and 24,” said Pearl, referencing Wilkinson and backcourt mate Marcus Millender, who scored 24 points and made 5 of 7 3-pointers. “It’s not the 3s I’m as concerned about. I’m more concerned about the one-on-one drives where they get into the paint. My biggest challenge for our guys is we have to have more of an identity in our one-on-one defense.”

Auburn wasn’t done. Hall made a layup that pulled the Tigers within two with 50 seconds to play. Auburn then got the stop it needed, but the Tigers turned it over with five seconds left, a costly miscue that led to a pair of free throws and the final four-point margin. 

Down the stretch in regulation, Overton’s layup gave Auburn its last lead with 5:37 to play in a game that featured 11 lead changes and single-digit leads from start to finish. 

With 1:22 to play and the Tigers trailing by two, Filip Jovic was called for a foul on what appeared to be a clean steal, sending Georgia to the line for two free throws that gave the Bulldogs an 87-83 lead. 

After the Tigers missed a 3-pointer, Jovic blocked a shot at the other end and Tahaad Pettiford scored on a floater in the lane to trim Georgia’s lead to 87-85 with 22 seconds remaining. 

The Bulldogs capitalized on an Auburn turnover and took a five-point lead on three free throws before Hall’s 3-point play brought the Tigers back within two with six seconds to go.

Georgia beat Auburn’s full-court press with a long pass and a dunk to go up 92-88 with five seconds left, setting the stage for Auburn’s dramatic last-second rally. 

Auburn outrebounded Georgia 50-35, getting seven rebounds apiece from Hall, Overton, KeShawn Murphy and Sebastian Williams-Adams and 10 from Jovic, who added 10 points to register his first double-double before fouling out in OT.

“This team (Georgia) is top 10 in the nation in rebounding, and we outrebounded them by 15,” Pearl said. “Filip was a phenomenal spark off the bench. He was plus-5 in plus-minus, did a lot of really good things for us. Filip is incredibly effective in those areas because he plays hard. We need more of that. His identity is to play hard and to win.”

Pettiford led the Tigers with 25 points before fouling out late in regulation. Hall scored 20 points, Overton contributed 19, Freeman scored 14 and Murphy added a dozen.

Auburn struggled at the rim and the free-throw line, missing 17 layups and 12 free throws, bothered by Georgia’s 6-11 center Somto Cyril, who blocked five shots, grabbed six rebounds and scored 15 points on 6-for-6 shooting. 

Georgia (13-1, 1-0) won its seventh straight game, improved to 10-0 at home and ended Auburn’s five-game series win streak. 

The Tigers (9-5, 0-1) return to the Plains Tuesday for their SEC home opener vs. Texas A&M at 8 p.m. CT on SEC Network and the Auburn Sports Network.

Jeff Shearer is a Senior Writer at AuburnTigers.com. Follow him on X: @jeff_shearer

GAME NOTES

• Auburn went with the starting lineup of Kaden Magwood, Kevin Overton, Keshawn Hall, Sebastian Williams-Adams and KeShawn Murphy. Magwood made his first career start. Overton and Hall have each started 13 games this season, while Murphy has 11 starts on the year and Williams-Adams has started seven of the first 14 games of his freshman season.
• Auburn leads the series against Georgia 104-98 all-time and has won 13 of the last 17 in the series. The Tigers are 7-3 in their last 10 games in Athens.
• With 204 combined points, Saturday’s game is the highest-scoring game in the 202-game series history between Auburn and Georgia, breaking the old mark of 192 points in a 99-93 Tigers win over the Bulldogs in Auburn on Jan. 10, 1972. It is the first time either team has reached the 100-point mark in the series. 
• The matchup with 23rd-ranked Georgia was Auburn’s sixth game against an AP Top 25 opponent in the first 14 games of the season.
• Auburn is 3-2 against ranked Georgia teams all-time.
• Auburn is 1-1 in overtime games this season after the Tigers defeated Bethune-Cookman 95-90 in the season opener before falling 104-100 at No. 23 Georgia on Saturday.
• Neither team held a double-digit lead in the game as Georgia’s biggest lead was nine at 53-44 with 18:28 left in regulation, while Auburn’s biggest lead was seven at 28-21 at the 8:53 mark in the first half.
• Auburn has reached the 100-point mark three times this season, including the last two games. It is the first time the Tigers have scored 100 or more points in consecutive games since Dec. 11 & 13, 1986, when they scored 115 points against Austin Peay and 107 points against Southwestern Louisiana, respectively.
• Auburn scored 50 points in the second half, which is the seventh 50-point half for the Tigers this season.
• Auburn went 24-of-36 from the free throw line. The 36 attempts are two off the Tigers’ season high of 38 attempts against Bethune-Cookman in the season opener. It is the seventh time Auburn has attempted at least 30 free throws and the eighth time the Tigers have made 20 or more free throws in a game this season.
• Auburn outrebounded Georgia, 50-35. It is the first time the Tigers have lost in nine games when they won the rebounding battle this season. It is the fourth time the Tigers have outrebounded an opponent by at least 15 boards on the year. Auburn’s 50 rebounds are its second-most on the season only trailing its 55 boards against Merrimack.
• Auburn placed six players in double figures for the first time since doing so against Richmond last season. The Tigers were led by 25 points from Pettiford, who scored 15 points in the first half after coming off the bench for the first time this season. He finished 10-of-21 from the floor, 3-of-11 from long range and 2-of-3 from the foul line to go with four assists, three rebounds and two steals in 32 minutes. 
• It is the third time in his career he has scored at least 15 points in the first half, including scoring 15 points before halftime in both games he has played in Athens to go with 16 points at Arizona earlier this season. He is averaging 17.1 points in 12 career road games, including 24.5 points in two games at Georgia. The sophomore made three 3-pointers on the day giving him 100 3-point field goals for his career.
• Hall recorded his 34th career 20-point game, including his eighth this season, finishing the afternoon with 20 points, including 9-of-12 from the free throw line. He has scored in double figures in all 13 games this season. Hall scored 14 of his 20 points in the second half. The senior pulled down seven rebounds, dished out four assists and added one block and one steal in 38 minutes.
• Overton scored 19 points, missing his third straight 20-point game and his fourth in the last six games by a single point. He is averaging 21.3 points over his last three games. He went 7-of-15 on field goals, including a pair of 3-pointers, and all three of his free throw attempts, and he added seven rebounds, two assists, one block and one steal in 39 minutes.
• Elyjah Freeman chipped in with 14 points on 5-of-9 shooting, including 2-of-4 from deep, to go with five rebounds and one assist in 23 minutes. It is his fifth game this season in double figures, including three in the last four games when he is averaging 16.5 points. 
• Murphy finished with 12 points on 4-of-7 field goals and 4-of-5 shooting from the foul line. He added seven boards and one steal in 22 minutes against the Bulldogs. It is his 31st career game in double figures, including four this season, and his first since scoring 12 points against Michigan on Nov. 25.
• Freshman Filip Jovic recorded his first career double-double with 10 points on 3-of-4 field goals and 4-of-5 from the free throw line and 10 rebounds in 22 minutes. It is Jovic’s third game in double figures on the season and his first since scoring 13 points against Michigan.