Bruce Pearl, Wendell Green give odd explanation for bizarre end-of-regulation possession

After falling to unranked Arkansas in overtime on Tuesday, Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl gave an interesting explanation for their final play of regulation. While tied 66-66, sophomore guard Wendell Green appeared to take an ill-advised three-point attempt. His shot missed, and the game went into overtime. In his postgame interview, Pearl claimed he was okay with Green’s shot selection.

Later on, in overtime, Auburn trailed by four and regained possession with 12 seconds remaining in the game. Green took a three-point attempt quickly, missing and ending the game, as well as Auburn’s 19-game winning streak.

Bruce Pearl and Wendell Green’s explanation of final regulation shot

“We had a play set up,” explained Pearl on Auburn’s final shot of regulation. “Wendell could have gotten downhill with a ball screen. Instead he chose to pull. He makes it, we win.”

With a tie game, many fans questioned the decision to take a difficult three-point attempt instead of getting to the basket for an easier shot or a possible foul call. However, Pearl defended his young playmaker’s decision to take what he felt was a good shot attempt. As Pearl stated, had Green made the shot, Auburn wins and avoids the upset.

“My teammates not really tripping about it, coach not really tripping about it,” said Green after the game on his shot decision.

The loss snapped Auburn’s tremendous 19-game winning streak, as the No. 1 team in the nation fell to an unranked SEC opponent. While the Tigers are certainly not pleased with the result, Pearl was congratulatory of the Arkansas effort after the game. After providing an explanation of what went wrong from his perspective, Bruce Pearl acknowledged that Auburn is a big target this season.

“We understand the price that’s on our head,” said Pearl on how it felt to see Arkansas fans storm the court after the game.

Eric Musselman on Auburn’s disrespectful pregame dancing

“It was awesome, what a game! You know, they danced on our logo before the game — we watched that,” said Arkansas head coach Eric Musselman after the game. What a great win for this program, it’s so awesome! I thought we played with incredible toughness. Auburn did a great job on the backboards — but our guys didn’t back down, we went toe-to-toe with them.”

Prior to tip-off, the Tigers did their pregame ritual of dancing in a team huddle to psych themselves up. This time however, it appeared that they were purposefully dancing a bit too close to the Razorbacks’ logo on center court. The fans in attendance caught the disrespect being shown, as well as the Arkansas players according to Musselman.