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Bruce Pearl adds former Tiger Bryant Smith to support staff

46 minutes ago

Bruce Pearl has replaced one former Auburn standout with another on his support staff.

Bryant Smith has been added to the Tigers' staff as a student assistant, the program announced Friday morning. Pearl is also bringing in Geoff Gray, a point guard in the Israeli Basketball Premier League, as a grad assistant.

In late July, grad assistant KT Harrell, a former All-SEC guard who played under Pearl in his first season at Auburn, landed a Division-I job as director of basketball operations at FAU.

A team captain on Auburn's 1998-99 SEC championship team, Smith started at forward his final two seasons with the program. The Huntsville, Alabama, native averaged 13.3 points, 6.6 boards and 2.4 steals per game as a junior in 1997-98.

"We are so thrilled to welcome Bryant Smith back to our program," Pearl said. "It's important to add another former player on our staff, who knows what it means to be an Auburn Man. He was also a part of teams that made history throughout his playing career on the Plains. He will be an invaluable mentor to our players having once been in their shoes."

Bryant played 14 seasons overseas.

"The opportunity to pour back into our players is very humbling," Smith said. "I hope to use my experiences, as a collegian and professional, to help continue to mold them into great players and even better Auburn Men."

Gray averaged 20.4 points per game at Emerson College during his senior season in 2018-19, leading the Lions to a conference title and a Division-III NCAA tournament berth. He went to Israel after graduation and played for two different pro teams in the country's premier league. Auburn played its foreign tour in Israel last month.

7COMMENTS

"I am ecstatic to be a part of this elite coaching staff and program," Gray said. "I have followed Coach Pearl and Auburn men's basketball for years. I could not think of a better way to transition into this next chapter of my career. I am very excited for the opportunity to learn from the best of the best in college basketball."

Auburn opens its 2022-23 campaign at home against George Mason on Nov. 7.

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23 hours ago, augolf1716 said:

Fantastic one of my all time favorite players I'll never forget this play

 

Agree. Porter got all of the headlines but Smith was the glue, IMO

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  • 3 weeks later...

One of my favorites! And the OP is correct, very underrated! Jim Fyffe ...” Hello Huntsville “ every time he dunked. He was a strong dunker!

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On 9/9/2022 at 1:45 PM, augolf1716 said:

Fantastic one of my all time favorite players I'll never forget this play

 

First thing I thought of!

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On 9/9/2022 at 12:45 PM, augolf1716 said:

Fantastic one of my all time favorite players I'll never forget this play

 

I showed my teenage son the opening 7 minutes of this game recently to let him know that AU occasionally fielded a basketball squad before Bruce Pearl arrived.     I love this team and Bryant Smith was the glue guy that took a talented team to another level.   The following year's team missed him big time, having the talent but missing the key role players.    

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I've posted on here a few times he was very under valued. He was the glue to that Chris Porter team. They weren't the same without him. He was a monster at Butler as well. Remember going to see them play and saying I was going to play something like that

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6 hours ago, cole256 said:

I've posted on here a few times he was very under valued. He was the glue to that Chris Porter team. They weren't the same without him. He was a monster at Butler as well. Remember going to see them play and saying I was going to play something like that

I would give a lot of credit to Doc for being the glue for that team. Doc and Bryant were very close friends Doc said he always wanted to play with with Bryant

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42 minutes ago, augolf1716 said:

I would give a lot of credit to Doc for being the glue for that team. Doc and Bryant were very close friends Doc said he always wanted to play with with Bryant

Doc was the point. He was good. But the team completely changed when Smith left. We didn't get to see it without doc. I didn't particulary see doc being extra close with Bryant. I spent a lot of time with them one summer. 

One thing many people don't know was one of my buddies Rudy Williams was recruited by Auburn and was supposed to replace Doc but he didn't take his grades seriously and never made it to Auburn. Very sad. He had NBA potential but no discipline. One of the best players I've ever played against

I was cool with Bryant cousin, I dated one of her friends. 

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