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Bruce Pearl: Auburn was ‘due for a letdown’ prior to loss to Florida
By Paul Harvey
Published:
Bruce Pearl has been proud of Auburn‘s effort and performance all season long. After all, the Tigers had just one loss — on the road to No. 2 Duke — coming into Saturday’s game against No. 6 Florida and was 10-0 at home.
However, it was the Gators who came out with a spirited first half that gave Florida a 10-point lead at the break. That lead grew to 16 points at one point before Florida finalized a 90-81 win over the Tigers, a 2nd win against a No. 1 team for the Gators this season.
In spite of Auburn’s impressive run, Pearl said after Saturday’s loss that he felt the Tigers were due for a letdown and expected it to “happen at any point.”
“(I) kind of sensed this was about to happen at any point,” Pearl admitted. “We have had greater effort and energy or at least matched the effort and energy of every team we played. I knew that we were due for a letdown.”
Pearl’s point kept coming back to the fact that he didn’t truly get Auburn to realize the gravity of this weekend’s game for Florida. Had the Gators lost, they would be 4 games behind in the league standings with just 1 month to play.
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Instead of falling back, Florida is now 2 games behind the top of the SEC standings with plenty to play for moving forward:
“Again, give Florida all the credit. If I were to re-do a few things, I don’t think I had our team understand how important this game was to Florida,” said Bruce Pearl. “Florida could be a Final Four team. If they lose this game, they’re 4 games behind us in the league. Now they’re only 2 and they’re still in it.
“They just came in here like they had to win it… They just played harder, they played better, they played more desperately. We did not look like the #1 team in the country. We didn’t act like the #1 team in the country. We didn’t prepare like it, and as a result, we got beat.”
Now, there is a chance that Alabama and Auburn could be playing for the outright lead in the SEC when the two teams meet next Saturday depending on the finish to Saturday night and the midweek outcomes. Either way, an epic season in the SEC appears headed toward an epic race down the stretch.
Paul Harvey lives in Atlanta and covers SEC football.
