Auburn never trailed and led by as many as 21 points in the second half before taking down the Razorbacks 88-77 Saturday night in Auburn Arena in front of a sellout crowd of 8,950 in attendance.
From the 11:24 mark of the second half until 5:07 remained, Arkansas (11-4, 1-2 SEC) put together a 19-5 run but still could not overcome the deficit as they never got closer than 7 points in the second half. Sixteen seconds into the game, Auburn’s Bryce Brown knocked down a 3-pointer, and the Tigers (14-1, 2-0 SEC) led the rest of the way. There was never even a tie after that, and Auburn took a 17-point lead into halftime.
Jaylen Barford and Daryl Macon entered the halftime locker room with just 2 points apiece. While Barford got it together and scored 19 points in the second half on 7 of 11 shooting, Macon never did. He scored 8 points in the second half with 4 of them coming at the free throw line. Macon was just 3 of 11 in the game. Barford averages 18.7 points per game this season while Macon averages 17.2.
Arkansas was 30 of 62 from the floor Saturday (48.4 percent), including 17 of 31 in the second half (54.8 percent). The Hogs were 4 of 19 from 3-point range (21.1 percent) and 13 of 19 from the foul line (68.4 percent). Arkansas only had a single turnover in the second half but still had 11 total to Auburn’s 9.
Mustapha Heron led the Tigers with 17 points and 6 rebounds. He was 3 of 4 from beyond the arc. Auburn connected on 30 of 58 shot attempts (51.7 percent), were 11 of 20 from 3-point range (55 percent) and 17 of 22 from the line (77.3 percent).
SECOND HALF RUNDOWN
Arkansas got the lead down to 11 points with 14:11 left on a jumper by Barford, but it was back out to 16 in a minute and-a-half on a layup by Davion Mitchell to make it 62-46 with 12:49 to play. And it wasn’t long before Auburn took their largest lead of the game, 21 points, on a thunderous dunk by Malik Dunbar with 11:24 to play.
Barford got hot in the second half and scored his 18th point right before the under-8 timeout and closed Auburn’s lead to 12 points. It was a 12-2 run for the Razorbacks to make it 70-58 with 7:54 to play in the game.
A Barford 3-pointer off a screen from Trey Thompson cut the lead to 9 points, 72-63, with 5:45 remaining. It was the first time the lead was cut to under 10 points since it was 29-20 with 8:48 remaining in the first half.
Arkansas knocked it down to 7 points on a pair of free throws by Thompson with 5:07 left. It was a 7-0 run for the Hogs inside of a 19-5 run that lasted 6 minutes and 17 seconds.
FIRST HALF RUNDOWN
Auburn opened with an 11-point lead and never trailed, 19-8, at the 14:03 mark of the first half. It was still an 11-point game with 11:41 to play at the under-12 media timeout with 11:41 to play. Heron already had 10 points for the Tigers on 4 of 6 shooting. The Tigers were 10 of 15 as a team, including 5 of 8 from downtown. Arkansas was 6 of 10 but 0 of 3 from beyond the arc.
Barford's first bucket did not come until the 5:07 mark of the first half on a bank shot jumper to cut Auburn’s lead from 15 to 13. Barford only had 2 shots before that but also bobbled away two break-a-way opportunities. Barford had 3 turnovers by the final media timeout of the half with 3:57 to play.
Arkansas broke an 0 of 7 start from 3-point range on a transition 3-pointer by Anton Beard with 2:25 left to take the Auburn lead down to 11, 41-30.
The Tigers’ largest lead was 17 points, which came on a put-back by Desean Murray with 29 seconds to play, 47-30. That was the last bucket of the half.
Beard led the Hogs with 9 first half points. Arkansas was 13 of 31 from the floor (41.9 percent), 1 of 9 from 3-point range (11.1 percent) and 3 of 6 from the foul line. Auburn was 19 of 35 shooting (54.3), 7 of 13 from 3 (53.8 percent) and 2 of 5 from the line (40 percent).
