AUBURN | Bruce Pearl calls them a three-headed monster.

No. 16 Purdue is led by junior guards Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer, and junior forward Trey Kaufman-Renn. They account for 58.4 percent of the Boilermaker’s offense.

No. 2 Auburn will certainly have to account for the trio during Saturday afternoon’s game in Birmingham.

“Smith is the Big Ten preseason Player of the Year. Analytically, he's the best point guard in the country,” said Pearl. “He just plays the game the right way. He's so much fun to watch. Regardless of how you guard him, he knows precisely the counter to everything that you do — and he knows it instinctively.

“Kaufman-Renn is the best scoring big in the Big Ten. He’s just got great hands, great feet, great touch. He’s an old-school, back-to-the-basket inside player that they do a great job getting him touches. Fletcher Loyer is one of the best shooters in college basketball. He’s developed some midrange stuff and some ability to take the ball off the floor.”

Smith is averaging 13.4 points and 8.5 assists per game while Loyer is averaging 13.5 points. The pair is shooting 45.6 percent combined from 3-point range.

Tasked with defending Smith and/or Loyer for most of the game will be AU senior Denver Jones, who has become AU’s starting point guard and top defensive stopper.

“He's gotta be a featured part of your game plan with how you guard him,” said Pearl of Smith. “If this team has a chance to continue to play at a high level, our guards will have to continue to guard like we've been guarding.

“Now, it's obviously going to be another challenge against Purdue. But that might be one thing that we might be doing better this year: Guarding overall, and certainly our guards have done a really nice job. And Denver leads that off.”

Kaufman-Renn offers his own problems inside the paint. The 6-foot-9, 230-pounder averages 18.2 points and 6.5 rebounds per game. He leads Purdue with 73 free throw attempts, which is significantly more than AU’s Chad Baker-Mazara’s team-leading 46.

Avoiding foul trouble will be a key for the Tigers’ big men, especially if Johni Broome is unable to play due to his injured shoulder.

“I’m sure Purdue, they’re not going to change how they play. They go to him,” said Pearl. “They’re going to go to him. But they know that without Johni, we would really be lacking for depth on the frontline and foul trouble could be a factor. We’ve got to defend without fouling.”

Purdue is 8-3 on the season with wins over No. 2 Alabama, No. 23 Ole Miss and Maryland, and losses to No. 15 Marquette, Penn State and No. 17 Texas A&M.

“They've got a great guard,” said AU forward Chaney Johnson. “In the scout, he's one of the better guards we're going to play the entire year. They have shooters surrounding him. They also have a great big. It's just a good team, and they play real hard. That's what stands out.”

Tip-off at Legacy Arena is scheduled for 3:30 p.m. CT on ESPN.