First Thoughts: No. 19 Auburn falls short at USC after messy second half

For the second-to-last non-conference matchup before SEC play starts, No. 19 Auburn traveled to Los Angeles, Calif. to play a talented USC team on Sunday afternoon. In the Tigers’ first true road game of the season, they came up just short, falling 74-71 after a half court buzzer beater from K.D. Johnson clanked off the back of the rim.

Auburn ended the first half with a 14-2 run and led 39-35 at intermission, but struggled in the second half offensively. The Tigers shot 53.6% in the first half, but just 36.8% in the second half.

New names on this season’s roster seemed to carry Auburn’s scoring game tonight but both were caught in foul trouble early in the second half. Sophomore transfer Johni Broome led the team in points with 16, and freshman Tre Donaldson followed with 12. Donaldson battled foul trouble in the second half playing limited minutes, and in the end, both Donaldson and Broome fouled out.

Auburn play Washington on Wednesday at 8 p.m. CT. The game will be televised on the Pac-12 Network. The final non-conference game of the season will be at West Virginia on January 28th.

As always, here’s some First Thoughts from Auburn’s second loss of the season.

Tre Donaldson shows continued development

Averaging just two points per game this season so far, Donaldson finished tonight with a career-high 12 points. In his first six minutes off the bench, the freshman broke his Auburn record of seven points, starting out 4-for-4 from the floor.

Freshman gettin' hot early! pic.twitter.com/qW0ZYgUgWo

— Auburn Basketball (@AuburnMBB) December 18, 2022

Unfortunately, Donaldson got into foul trouble early on in the second half and fouled out at the end of the game. The freshman is continuing to gain more and more playing time. Donaldson’s solid outing against USC follows up his six-point, two-rebound performance in 18 minutes against Georgia State on Wednesday. Before tonight, Donaldson played in just eight of 10 games and was averaging single-digit minutes played per game.

Another productive night for Johni Broome

Broome, the sophomore transfer from Morehead State, might be starting to find his groove. In the first half, Broome put up 11 points with three rebounds and two blocks, contributing to Auburn’s 39-35 lead at halftime. He finished with a team-high 16 points on 7-8 shooting from the floor. Before tonight, Broome averaged 11.1 points per game. He also added eight rebounds in the game. In the last two games, Broome is 13-16 from the floor, scoring 29 points and grabbing 15 rebounds.

Auburn improvements in rebounding

On a positive note, Auburn finished up with 32 total rebounds tonight, 13 more than USC’s 19. Broome led the team with eight. Dylan Cardwell followed with five. The Tigers produced 10 points off of their rebounds while the Trojans only produced eight.

Second-half implosion

In the first half, Auburn committed just six fouls. In just the first five minutes of the second half, Auburn committed six fouls. USC entered the double bonus with over 10 minutes left to play, allowing them to get 20 points on fouls alone for the game. The Trojans, however, had just 11 fouls in the second half and 15 total fouls. It was certainly a road game in more ways than one.

On top of that, Auburn finished the night with a season-high 23 turnovers, with 14 of those turnovers coming in the second half. The lack of ball security contributed to 23 points off turnovers for USC. Auburn entered the game ranked 177th nationally in turnovers, averaging 13.1 per game.

Too many players with little to no offensive production

Wendell Green Jr. suffered a sprained ankle in the Georgia State game on Wednesday, but was back in the starting lineup tonight. The injury is still a problem for Green Jr. He was 0-4 from the field, made two free throws, and sat the majority of the second half after his injured ankle wouldn’t let him go any longer.

Before sitting out against Georgia State, KD Johnson played 43 straight games. The junior returned against USC, but also lacked production. Johnson scored only six points (all from the FT line), was 0-5 from the field, and committed six turnovers.

And then there’s Allen Flanigan, who scored nine points, but only made one three in six attempts, and committed a critical offensive foul late in the game that cost Auburn a valuable possession as time was running out.

Toss in Chance Westry’s impactless performance and Yohan Traore only hitting one corner three, and too many Tigers simply didn’t produce much of anything on the offensive end of the floor.