Auburn's Physicality Too Much For Indiana in 104-76 Rout in Atlanta

Indiana got off to a quick start but then completely fell apart in an ugly 104-76 loss to Auburn on Saturday at State Farm Arena in Atlanta. They gave up 14 three-pointers and got pushed around all game, with Auburn dominating them in every phase. The Hoosiers are 7-2 now, but clearly can't hang with top-tier teams.

ATLANTA, Ga. — There were no surprises in Auburn's game plan against Indiana. They were going to play physical, and do it that way for 94 feet. Indiana's guards were going to feel the brunt of that pressure, but so were their bigs.

Nothing was going to come easy.

Turns out, none of it did. Despite jumping out to a quick 12-point behind — get this, 3-point shooting — Indiana got boat-raced on Saturday. They were clobbered 104-76 by Auburn and never had a chance.

Auburn, unquestionably, was the best team on the floor. And it wasn't even close.

With the loss, the Hoosiers are now 7-2 on the season. The other loss, to then-No. 5 Connecticut in another neutral-site game at Madison Square Garden in New York, was also a 20-point beatdown. Indiana's aggressive scheduling is admirable, but you've also got to show up and be competitive.

They weren't, outside of the first few minutes.

"I'm not happy with the way we played tonight,'' Indiana coach Mike Woodson said. "It's kind of like a carbon copy of the UConn game.I thought we came out ready to play. The all was moving, we got defensive stops, we rebounded the ball. 

"Then we just stopped playing. I made some lineup changes with the bench. Once they smacked us in the mouth, we stopped playing. The starters went back in when we were tied, and they stopped playing too. We didn't have an answer for anything they threw at us, and that was disappointing because they didn't do anything we weren't expecting them to do."

Indiana came into the game averaging only 3.1 made three-pointers per game, which ranked dead last — No. 351 — in the NCAA. But in the first three-plus minutes of the game, they hit four long balls, which tied their season high for a game.

Indiana stretched its lead to 12 at 22-10 at the 12:54 mark, but then Auburn made a run against Indiana's bench following a mass substitution by Indiana coach Mike Woodson. Auburn also made it much more uncomfortable for Indiana's shooters the rest of the half, and points were hard to come by.

In the final 13 minutes, Indiana only scored 12 more points under intense pressure from Auburn defensively. The Tigers also were scoring on practically every possession. They scored 42 points in those 13 minutes and went to halftime with an 18-point lead at 52-34.

The Hoosiers couldn't do anything right. They made just 3-of-17 shots when Auburn took off, and missed all four three-point attempts in the 42-12 run. Freshman point guard Gabe Cupps made the first three, and finished the half with six points. But he got no other help from the other guards, Trey Galloway, CJ Gunn and Anthony Leal. Galloway and Gunn didn't score at all, and had two and three fouls respectively. Leal made two late free throws, but that was it.

Indiana did have one spurt early in the second half where they cut the lead from 19 to 11 in the first four minutes, but they would get no closer. Auburn went on an 18-2 run to blow the game open, making 7-of-10 threes in an 8-minute window that pushed the lead to 30 at one point with two minutes to go.

It was the most points allowed by a Mike Woodson-coached team in regulation. Syracuse scored more (112) in a double-over time back in 2021, but this was by far the worst.

Auburn made 14-of-29 three-point attempts and 8-of-12 in the second half. They only had three turnovers all day, and one was a shot clock violation where they were just holding the ball at the end of the game.

They were the better team, the most physical team, the better prepared team. They also played their ''best game of the year,'' Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said. "We played really well, and up and down our roster, virtually every player had a really good day. 

"I wouldn't be so hard on IU on this one in the sense that I don't know right now if we could play much better. We shot the ball well, we defended well, we secured the basketball and each and every player played at a really high level.''

That wasn't much of a consolation for the Hoosiers. The first three minutes were great — Mackenzie Mgbako made two threes, and Gabe Cupps and Kel'el Ware made one, too — but after that nothing went right. 

The Hoosiers, after making 4-of-5 from deep, went 0-for-9 in the next 29 minutes and finished 6-for-17 from deep. It was, sadly, their best perimeter shooting game of the year. They hadn't made more than four threes in any of the first eight games.   

This was the third of four straight high-profile games for Indiana in early December. The Hoosiers beat Maryland and Michigan to open the Big Ten season last week — and felt really good about doing it. Saturday, after the 28-point drubbing, they were flat-out embarrassed.

Giving up 104 points for a team takes a lot of pride in its defense is a tough pill to swallow. Highs and lows, for sure.

"It definitely hurts. We gave up 100 and something, and that's the biggest thing,'' sophomore forward Malik Reneau said. "It's not an NBA game We need to be better in getting back in transition. We've got to get back on defense. There were a lot of plays where we lost our man, where we didn't get bodies on bodies. 

"A lot of that has to change. We'll get back to the drawing board, and we'll work really hard this week before Kansas.''

Reneau led the Hoosiers with 15 points. Ware had 13, but was just 2-for-8 from the field. Cupps had a career-high 11 points, and Mackenzie Mgbako had 10. He was 2-for-7 from three-point range, missing all five after his first two makes in the first few minutes. 

Auburn (6-2) got 40 points from its bench, and had 25 assists to just three turnovers. 

It doesn't get any easier for Indiana. The Hoosiers take on No. 2 Kansas next Saturday at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall in Bloomington. 

Related stories on Indiana-Auburn

• LIVE BLOG: Relive all the play-by-play in real time in Jack Ankony's live blog straight from press row at State Farm Arena in Atlanta. CLICK HERE
• HOW TO WATCH: Indiana continues the 2023-24 season on Saturday against the Auburn Tigers at State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Here's how to watch, game time and TV information, the point spread and over/under, the coaching matchup, series history, stats, rankings and more. CLICK HERE
• ATLANTA HOMECOMING FOR WOODSON, BANKS, NEWTON: Indiana's game against Auburn on Saturday in Atlanta, Ga. represents a homecoming of sorts for Mike Woodson, who coached the Atlanta Hawks from 2004-10, as well as Georgia natives Kaleb Banks and Jakai Newton. CLICK HERE
• PEARL PREVIEWS INDIANA: Heading into Saturday's game against Indiana, here's what Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said about the Hoosiers, as well as a few memories Pearl has of Bob Knight while he was coaching Southern Indiana. CLICK HERE
• INDIANA 2023-24 SCHEDULE: Here is the 2023-24 Indiana basketball schedule with game times and television designations released for all games. We'll update this file throughout the season as well with links to the stories from all of the games played so far. CLICK HERE