Commodores Begin SEC Play Tonight At Auburn

The SEC basketball season has begun, and the Commodores will kick off their conference slate against the No. 5-ranked Auburn Tigers Wednesday evening at Auburn Arena. Vanderbilt is looking for their first road win of the season and will face a hostile crowd and a Final Four team from a season ago.

After their improbable and unexpected run to the Final Four a season ago, Bruce Pearl's squad was expected to perhaps take a slight step back but that has not been the case to this point.

The Tigers are in the top 20 in the country in scoring and rebounding, with the latter being an area where the Commodores struggle, this is a tough matchup for Jerry Stackhouse's team.

Entering tonight the Tigers average 82.0 ppg and 42.3 rebounds per game, both good for 12th nationally. They are allowing just 65.8 ppg defensively which has led to their 13-0 start to the season.

Auburn possesses a balanced offense where four players average double-digit scoring led by Samir Doughty who averages 16.3 ppg followed by Issac Okoro (12.9), J'von McCormick (11.9), and Austin Wiley (10.8) points per game. Wiley is averaging just short of a double-double this season, collecting an average of 9.2 rebounds per contest as well.

Not only are the Tigers talented, but they are deep too, having nine players who average double-digit minutes per contest.

Along with the aforementioned, Danjel Purifoy, Anfernee McLemore, Jamal Johnson, and Devan Cambridge also see double-digit minutes for Auburn.

Aaron Nesmith leads Vanderbilt and will, without doubt, be the focal point for the Tigers defense, meaning that for the Commodores to have any chance of pulling off the upset, there must be someone else step up and score the basketball for the Commodores.

Of course, Vanderbilt lacks a true post presence and has with teams that do, and with Wiley (6'11" 260) inside it will be a tall order on the road for the Commodores.

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