Bruce Pearl can’t help but think about last season’s Auburn team when he looks across the state at the Tigers’ biggest rival.

No. 3 Alabama is in the middle of its own historic season — one that continues Saturday with a 1 p.m. showdown between the cross-state programs at Neville Arena — and it’s being led by an elite freshman forward and soon-to-be NBA lottery pick, no less. Sound familiar?

“The kind of year (Brandon Miller)’s having for Alabama reminds you so much of the kind of year that Jabari (Smith) had for us,” Pearl said Thursday afternoon.

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Brandon Miller has been the centerpiece of the Tide’s success this season. The five-star freshman, who was the No. 14 overall player in the 2022 class, has lived up to the expectations in his first, and surely only, season of college ball.

The 6-foot-9 forward leads the SEC in scoring at 19 points per game while shooting at a 45.7 percent clip. That includes 44.4 percent from 3-point range, which is tops in the league and tied for ninth in the country this season.

Miller is also fourth in the conference in rebounding at 8.2 boards per game, and he has scored in double figures in 23 of Alabama’s 24 games this season, including all 11 games in SEC play. The one time he didn’t break double figures, he was held to eight points on 0-of-8 shooting in Alabama’s win against then-No. 1 Houston in December.

Miller’s prodigious freshman season has helped Alabama to a No. 3 national ranking in the AP poll and No. 2 in NET rankings. The Tide are undefeated in SEC play and atop the conference standings while defeating league opponents by an average of 22.3 points per game.

“He is a great player,” Auburn center Dylan Cardwell said of Miller. “I’m just very intrigued in his shots. Very efficient player. Doesn’t really have that many games where he’s in single-digit scoring. I think he’s one of the only players in the SEC, one of two only players to score double digits in all SEC games. So, I know he’s a heck of a scorer and a heck of a competitor, and he’s the life of that team, and I’ve been very impressed with his 3-point shooting.”

It’s easy to see why Pearl likened Miller’s impact for the Tide to that of Smith’s last season for the Tigers. Behind Smith, Auburn earned the program’s first-ever No. 1 ranking and went wire-to-wire atop the SEC standings before earning a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Smith, the National Freshman of the Year and Auburn’s second-ever consensus All-American, averaged a team-leading 16.9 points on 42.9 percent shooting, including 42 percent from deep, last season while chipping in 7.4 rebounds and two assists per game.

“(Miller) can score on all three levels,” Pearl said. “He may have been 6-7 in high school, (but) he’s legitimately 6-9 now, and he’s a 6-9 two-guard. He presents just enormous challenges as far as how you guard them and whether you can switch or not, because he’ll take advantage. He’ll just take advantage of matchups.”

Pearl, like many coaches, attempted to land Miller at his program. Auburn even hosted him on an official visit back in June 2021, but it was an admittedly uphill battle for Pearl and his staff considering Miller’s father, Darrell Miller, played tight end at Alabama in the 1990s for coach Gene Stallings.

“He’s a great, great player, great talent, great kid, great family,” Pearl said. “…We just couldn’t break that Roll Tide. Dad played football (at Alabama), just you know, and (we) thought he was actually going to go pro.”

Miller, of course, didn’t go the professional route out of high school and instead signed with Nate Oats’ program. Now Pearl and Auburn will get their first of two regular-season looks at the freshman phenom when Alabama visits the Plains on Saturday afternoon.

“He is a talented freshman,” Auburn center Johni Broome said. “He is very skilled. He can score at the basket…He is deadly from 3-point range. He is a good player, but we have just got to pressure him. Don’t let him get the open looks — make all of his shots tough, and I think we will be fine.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.