AUBURN | I imagine if Jabari Smith wanted to dominate games on offense, he could average well over 20 points.
But he doesn’t and it’s made Auburn a better team. And in turn, it’s making Smith a better player.
Just look at the Kentucky game and two of the most important plays Smith made were his block of a shot by Oscar Tshiebwe with 5:07 left in the game and his reach-around pass to Walker Kessler for a dunk with 1:28 left.
His stat line from the UK game shows a player that is involved in every aspect of his team: 14 points, seven rebounds, two assists, one steal and two blocks in 30 minutes.
By only playing 30 minutes, by not demanding the ball on offense all of the time like some other projected No. 1 overall NBA Draft picks might, Smith has given his teammates more opportunities to shine.
None more than Jaylin Williams, who came off the bench to score seven points in 10 minutes. Williams, Wendell Green, Dylan Cardwell and Devan Cambridge give AU one of its greatest weapons this season, a bench that has out-scored seven SEC opponents 193-110.
One of Bruce Pearl’s strongest assets as a coach is player management and this team is a great example. Williams, Cardwell and Cambridge, not to mention Chris Moore, could be getting a lot more minutes for a lot of other teams in this conference.
That Pearl has veteran players like Williams excelling in limited roles and has a super-talented freshman like Smith performing more like a wily veteran, is what makes this team special.
It’s a team full of team players and that's put them in position to make this one of the most special teams in school history.
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Barring any unexpected departures, Bryan Harsin has put together his staff of full-time assistants for the 2022 season. It includes five different coaches than what he started with a year ago. That much turnover in a year could be viewed negatively, but it really doesn’t matter in the long run. There’s only one thing that matters, one thing that will determine whether the new staff is a success or not — and that’s winning.
And there’s absolutely nothing this staff can do to affect winning more right now than recruiting — in the transfer portal, for the remaining spots in the 2022 class and getting ’23 off to a strong start. While Auburn lost in the Birmingham Bowl, its two biggest rivals played for a national championship. By far the biggest disparity between AU and UA/UGA is the talent gap. If the Tigers are going to start climbing back into championship contention, the gap has to close fast.
It shouldn’t be a four- or five-year project either. Schools that recruit like UA and UGA roll over their best players, a whole lot of them, every three years. The transfer portal allows teams to rebuild a roster quickly with the ability to add experienced and talented players. In his second season at Michigan State, Mel Tucker added 15 players from the portal, transforming his roster and his team. The Spartans went from being 2-5 in 2000 to 11-2 and a top 10 finish in 2021, the biggest turnaround in program history.
The Tigers could use a little turnaround of their own after back-to-back six-win seasons.
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In today’s musical journey, we go back 33 years to the night an artist was arrested on stage for violating a local ordinance on lewdness, booked at jail, paid a fine and then returned to finish his show. On Jan. 25, 1989, Bobby Brown was arrested and booked in Columbus, Ga., for a violation of new local Ordinance No. 87-32 after bringing a girl on stage and “dirty-dancing” with her during his Don’t Be Cruel Tour. Brown was booked into the Muscogee County jail, paid a $652 fine and returned to the stage about an hour later. Columbus implemented the law after a 1987 Beastie Boys concert, which included several controversial incidents including having a large inflatable penis on the stage. Both LL Cool J and KISS bass player Gene Simmons were arrested under the ordinance.
Robert Barisford Brown was born in Boston in 1969. He started out singing in the church choir before becoming a founding member of New Edition as a 12-year old in 1981. The group had their first hit with 1982’s Candy Girl and really took off with 1984’s Cool It Now and Mr. Telephone Man. Brown left New Edition in 1986 to embark on a solo career. His second solo studio album, 1988’s Don’t Be Cruel, had five top 10 hits including a Billboard No. 1 in My Prerogative. He won a Grammy and two American Music Awards from the album. He went on to release three more albums, make appearances in ore than a dozen films and starred in a reality T.V. show on Bravo. Brown, who was married to Whitney Houston from 1992-2007, has struggled with alcohol and drug addiction for most of his life and has been arrested more than a dozen times. As a dancer, he’s credited with teaching Michael Jackson how to moonwalk. One of his latest public appearances came on the 2021 T.V. show The Masked Singer.
