After a rough first half for Auburn, the Tigers put together a second half surge that nearly gave them a road win against Texas A&M.

Ultimately, after a last-second bucket from Andre Gordon that left 0.9 seconds on the clock, Auburn fell 68-66 to the Aggies.

Auburn’s leading-scorer for the game, Jamal Johnson, heaved up a half-court shot at the buzzer but couldn’t get it to fall.

“I’m proud of my kids for the way they battled,” head coach Bruce Pearl said. “Texas A&M is an outstanding defensive team and they rattled our cages and pressured us and turned us over and made it really difficult for us to run the offense we wanted to run.”

The Tigers dug themselves a hole in the first half, failing to generate any offense and scoring just 22 points, trailing 33-22 at the half.

“It was an ugly first half but at least we competed,” Pearl said. “Even though we were down 11, offensively, we played bad enough – completely out of the game — but that’s, our kids have better character than that and they stayed in it.”

As a team they shot 7-of-26 from the field and 1-of-13 in the first half, with just two total assists.

But in the second half, it was a different story.

Auburn shot 17-of-31 from the field and 10-of-20 from deep helping lead the Tigers comeback attempt.

“In the second half obviously, you know, we started to be able to move the ball a little bit better, get the ball where we wanted to get it, shot it, obviously making 10 threes in the second half alone.”

Just as the game seemed out of reach, Johnson hit a triple to make the game 64-62 and then Devan Cambridge stole the ball and got a layup on the other end to tie it at 64.

With Auburn down 66-64, Jaylin Williams got a steal and dropped it off to JT Thor who hammered it home and tied it at 66 before A&M’s last-second bucket.

The young Auburn team is now 6-4 and 0-2 in SEC play, with a road matchup against Ole Miss up next.

“Look, we’re learning and we’re growing,” Pearl said.

STATS:

Jamal Johnson: 20 points, 6-16 FG, 5-14 3FG, +10 (25 Minutes)

Allen Flanigan: 16 points, 6-11 FG, 4-7 3FG, 5 rebounds, 4 assists, 6 turnovers, +4 (36 minutes)

JT Thor: 10 points, 5-8 FG, 0-1 3FG, 5 rebounds, 1 assist, -4 (29 minutes)

Devan Cambridge: 9 points, 3-8 FG, 1-5 3FG, 6 rebounds, 2 assists, +1 (27 minutes)

Stretch Akingbola: 4 points, 2-2 FG, 1 rebound, 1 block, -16 (12 minutes)

Jaylin Williams: 3 points, 1-3 FG, 1-3 3FG, 2 rebounds, 7 assists, 2 steals, +5 (20 minutes)

Justin Powell: 2 points, 0-5 FG, 0-3 3FG, 4 rebounds, 2 assists, -15 (21 minutes)

Dylan Cardwell: 2 points, 1-1 FG, 6 rebounds, +4 (11 minutes)

Javon Franklin: 0 points, 0-2 FG, 1 rebound, 1 block, +7 (8 minutes)

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