women win first SEC tournament game since 2020

[aubiefifty 16,805]

al.com

Auburn women’s basketball wins first SEC tourney game since 2020, draws LSU next

Updated: Mar. 07, 2024, 8:32 p.m.|Published: Mar. 07, 2024, 7:35 p.m.

4–5 minutes

GREENVILLE, SC - MARCH 07 - Auburn's JaMya Mingo-Young (2) during the game between the (7) Auburn Tigers and the (10) Arkansas Razorbacks at Bon Secours Wellness Arena in Greenville, SC on Thursday, March 7, 2024. Photo by Zach Bland/Auburn TigersZach Bland/Auburn Tigers

Auburn Tigers fifth-year senior Ja’Mya Mingo-Young said she and her teammates “got chewed out at halftime” despite their six-point lead over Arkansas.

Meanwhile, Auburn head coach Johnnie Harris made it sound a bit more pleasant.

“I just told them they weren’t playing hard,” Harris said of her message at halftime. “We weren’t playing smart, we weren’t following our gameplan, so I just kinda got after them a little bit.”

Regardless of how Harris’ message was delivered, it was received by Auburn, which outscored Arkansas by 13 points in the second half on their way to a 67-48 win in the second round of the SEC Tournament Thursday night in Greenville, S.C.

MORE: Auburn’s women’s basketball looking to ‘take the ifs out’ at SEC Tournament

For the Tigers, Thursday night’s win not only avenged Feb. 4′s regular season loss to the Razorbacks, but it also gave Auburn its first SEC Tournament win since 2020, as well as the program’s 20th win of the season.

And the Tigers did it, essentially, without their leading scorer in fifth-year senior guard Honesty Scott-Grayson.

Scott-Grayson, who was named an all-SEC first teamer on Tuesday, entered the night averaging more than 18 points per game and logged 27 points against Arkansas back in February.

On Thursday night, however, the Razorbacks had Scott-Grayson’s number and held her to just six points on 3-for-11 shooting. Scott-Grayson’s offensive output on Thursday was the second lowest she’s recorded all season.

“Being able to do that offensively with Honesty not having an Honesty-like game... If we’re scoring and she’s just playing, she’s okay,” Harris said of Scott-Grayson. “If she needed to take over, she absolutely would have.”

Fortunately for Auburn, there was no need for Scott-Grayson to take over as the Tigers’ bench tallied 31 points in the win.

Leading the Tigers’ offensive efforts was fifth-year senior guard Ja’Mya Mingo-Young, sophomore Sydney Shaw and junior Mar’shaun Bostic. The trio of guards logged 11 points apiece while Mingo-Young wasn’t far from a triple-double as she also tallied eight rebounds and dished eight assists in the win.

But staying true to the look of a Johnnie Harris-coached team, it was Auburn’s defense that paced its offense.

By halftime, the Tigers had forced Arkansas to commit 11 turnovers. By the game’s final whistle, that number swelled to 16 turnovers.

And off those 16 forced turnovers, Auburn scored 19 points. Meanwhile, Arkansas logged just nine points off turnovers.

“It’s a non-negotiable,” Harris said of getting her team to buy in to her style of defense. “They do not have a choice. They’re either going to defend, you’re going to play the way we tell you or you’re not going to play. They don’t have a choice and that seems to work.”

With Thursday’s win, the Tigers advance into the tournament quarterfinal, where they’ll meet a familiar foe in the LSU Tigers.

Auburn and LSU have already met twice this season with one meeting ending in a win for Auburn and one meeting ending in a win for LSU.

“I’ll tell you what, it’s pretty much the same gameplan,” Harris said of Friday’s rubber match against LSU. “We’ll tweak some things, but pretty much the same gameplan. It’s been working. But we do have to tweak some things. The way we play, that’s who we are... We’re going to have to play smarter than we did today. But that has been able to keep us in ball games, so that’s the plan.”

Auburn will take on the defending national champions in the LSU Tigers Friday at 5 p.m. in a game that’s set to be televised on SEC Network.

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[ArgoEagle 1,790]

All right! We'll take it, but if S-G only scores 6 points tonight our girls might as well have their bags packed.

[warladytigers 174]

3 hours ago, ArgoEagle said:

All right! We'll take it, but if S-G only scores 6 points tonight our girls might as well have their bags packed.

Hope we all shoot well.  In the first game against LSwho we shoot 44.1% and in the second only 37.5%.  Will need to be at least at 45% (my guess) to beat them today and the defense will need to not foul and get Angel in foul trouble!

[TD1 227]

8 minutes ago, warladytigers said:

Hope we all shoot well.  In the first game against LSwho we shoot 44.1% and in the second only 37.5%.  Will need to be at least at 45% (my guess) to beat them today and the defense will need to not foul and get Angel in foul trouble!

and get more rebounds. Reese had 20 to our team's 28. 

[e808 3,028]

Good win for the ladies 

[NCAubs 377]

We are down three TDs to LSU early.  0-21. 

[arktiger1975 518]

1 minute ago, NCAubs said:

We are down three TDs to LSU early.  0-21. 

Well, looks like we don't deserve to get in. LSU is overrated.

[arktiger1975 518]

What a pathetic performance so far! Totally unprepared, no heart.

[PUB78 1,358]

This is embarrassing. I hope the team can turn it around.

[arktiger1975 518]

10 minutes ago, PUB78 said:

This is embarrassing. I hope the team can turn it around.

Yep, and LSU isn't even that good. Living off of last year.

[Tigger1985 808]

Boy do we need to hit the recruiting trail and portal. We have a center that can’t jump. One of their players is within two points of our total score.

[Tigger1985 808]

We finally made a three in the third quarter 😳

Edited March 9 by Tigger1985

[arktiger1975 518]

Hello WNIT

[PUB78 1,358]

I hope this very poor showing doesn’t keep the Ladies out of the NCAA.

[aucanucktiger 1,794]

That first quarter was insane.

[Tigger1985 808]

Looks like LSU brought their officials with them as they only have 2 fouls this half 

[arktiger1975 518]

1 minute ago, Tigger1985 said:

Looks like LSU brought their officials with them as they only have 2 fouls this half 

I hope South Carolina beats the brakes off of them.

[TD1 227]

I just checked the box score and saw that HSG only has 2 points? Has she been playing alot this game?

[Tigger1985 808]

We shot 31% so we missed 69% of our shots. Yes she was on the court. 

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,673]

Just looking at the stats, they put us in a locker. May skim through part of the game, but from when I was occasionally checking the ESPN app earlier, we were lucky to lose it by 30

I feel like we’ve done a good job of finding other contributors recently outside of Honesty, but they also get boosted with playing off of her. In looking at the highlights, she got banged up in the first, so I figure that she was just limited throughout. 
 

Hopefully one of the incoming guards are good at facilitating, bc I think we lose both of our gals that are dependable in that respect. Maybe Shaw has some more progression too. 

[Mikey 16,622]

When Beard-Eaves was bright and shiny and new, I saw AU jump on Ga. Tech 22-4. Last night's 21-0 was worse. I still hold that our worst start gets credited to Tony Barbee. When the Auburn Arena (now Neville) was bright and shiny and new Barbee's team, playing in the first ever SEC game in there was behind LSU 37-6 at half time. Congrats Barbee, you still hold the record for the worst start to a game that I've ever seen.

[mustache eagle 2,406]

8 hours ago, Mikey said:

When Beard-Eaves was bright and shiny and new, I saw AU jump on Ga. Tech 22-4. Last night's 21-0 was worse. I still hold that our worst start gets credited to Tony Barbee. When the Auburn Arena (now Neville) was bright and shiny and new Barbee's team, playing in the first ever SEC game in there was behind LSU 37-6 at half time. Congrats Barbee, you still hold the record for the worst start to a game that I've ever seen.

There is simply no pits of hell worse than Barbee.  Possibly the worst D1 coach in history.  Damn near criminal.

[NCAubs 377]

26 minutes ago, mustache eagle said:

There is simply no pits of hell worse than Barbee.  Possibly the worst D1 coach in history.  Damn near criminal.

Jeff Lebo would like to dispute your claim.  Not saying he’s right…

[arktiger1975 518]

4 hours ago, NCAubs said:

Jeff Lebo would like to dispute your claim.  Not saying he’s right…

Lebo is John Wooden compared to Barbee.

[akillshot 296]

8 minutes ago, arktiger1975 said:

Lebo is John Wooden compared to Barbee.

Absolutely