Bruce Pearl has never been short of strong opinions. However, his recent television appearances have somewhat put him in the middle of a firestorm for reasons beyond basketball analysis. Pearl was the former Auburn head coach who is now working as a TNT analyst. He spent his past few days making a case for Auburn’s NCAA Tournament credentials, but people have noticed one very inconvenient detail. His son, Steve Pearl, is now the one in his old job as the head coach for the Tigers.
The criticism around Pearl being a paid analyst and publicly campaigning for a team that his son coaches had been making headlines. So, in his recent interaction with Dave Portnoy of Barstool Sports, Pearl addressed the elephant in the room without flinching.
“There’s no love of my son. I mean, there’s no nepotism involved here,” Pearl said
The Tigers sit at 15-14 and 6-10 in the SEC, having dropped seven of their last eight games. By most conventional metrics, that is not the best fit for the March Madness. However, Pearl is not buying that narrative at all. He argued that the Tigers are “last four in” territory and just need to beat LSU on Tuesday and win their SEC Tournament game to book their tickets for the postseason. He said,
“They’ve got five Quad 1 wins. They’ve got the best win in college basketball on the road at Florida. As far as that margin, it’s either the best or one of the best. So they got a little bit more work to do.”
Now, whether to believe Pearl’s words likely depends on how much stock one is willing to put in Auburn’s resume versus the optics of the situation. If Pearl intends to or not, the lines between analyst and Auburn advocate seems bluured. With Selection Sunday approaching, every word he says on television will continue to be scrutinized under a microscope.
Can Auburn Make It to the Postseason?
The case for Auburn making the NCAA Tournament is built entirely on one thing – schedule difficulty. The Tigers have played the toughest schedule in college basketball this season, facing 16 Quad 1 games (more than any program in the country). Despite sitting 15-14, Auburn is borderline top-40 nationally in resume ranking and holds five Quad 1 wins, keeping them in the same conversation as Missouri and Texas.
The problem is that Auburn’s margin for error has essentially evaporated. The Tigers entered February projected to be in the top half of the bracket. But now, it seems like they will exit as a bubble team, with more projections placing them in the First Four play-in games in Dayton than anywhere else on the Bracket Matrix.
A realistic path forward likely requires finishing 2-1 in the regular season and winning at least two games in the SEC Tournament in Nashville.
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