Auburn hangs on to beat Coastal Carolina 81-78

CONWAY, S.C. (AP) Tyler Harris had 21 points and 12 rebounds, and Kareem Canty made two free throws with 11.7 seconds to help Auburn hold off Coastal Carolina 81-78 on Wednesday night.

Shivaughn Wiggins, who scored 17 points, missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer for Coastal Carolina.

TJ Lang added 14 points as six players scored in double figures, combining for all but one point for Auburn (4-1). The Tigers picked up their first non-conference road win in three years.

''Tyler Harris was terrific,'' Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said. ''Tyler has a lot of real strengths in his game - scores inside, scores outside, good passer, can put it on the floor, moves his feet defensively.''

Harris went 5 of 9 from the field and 11 of 14 from the foul line.

The Chanticleers (3-4), who trailed by 18 midway through the second half, went on an 18-4 run to close within 78-75 with 43 seconds left when Harris fouled out.

Cinmeon Bowers, who had 12 points, made a free throw for a four-point lead but Elijah Wilson drained his fifth 3-pointer of the half to make it 79-78 with 24.4 seconds left. Wilson finished with 25 points.

Coastal Carolina couldn't get a steal and fouled Canty, who finished 5 of 7 from the line and scored 11 points.

In the first half, Auburn used an 11-0 run to take a 13-6 lead six minutes into the game. The lead was at 12 with 1:43 remaining but the Chanticleers made 5 of 6 free throws and a basket by Colton Ray-St Cyr capped a 7-2 run to make it 44-37 at the break.

Byrce Brown came off the bench to hit three 3-pointers and scored 10 points in the first half for Auburn, which shot 50 percent and hit 8 of 18 3-pointers. But the Tigers shot just 36 percent in the second half, including 3 of 13 treys.

Coastal Carolina shot 38 percent in the first half, making just 2 of 12 3-pointers.

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TIP-INS

Auburn: The Tigers were without injured point guard Tahj Shamsid-Deen. T.J. Dunans handled most of the point guard duties and responded with 10 points and five assists with two turnovers. ... The Tigers are off for 10 days for finals.

Coastal Carolina: The Chanticleers won 58-54 last year at Auburn. ... Wilson went over 1,000 career points in Saturday's game, the 20th in school history to reach that milestone.

QUOTABLE

''To win without Tahj and have Kareem Canty have his first just OK game is really pretty good,'' Pearl said.

''It was survival because we were discombobulated. We're going to learn a lot from it.''

UP NEXT

Auburn goes to Nashville to play Middle Tennessee State on Dec. 12.

Coastal Carolina plays its second Big South Conference game against visiting Radford on Sunday.