In Auburn’s own home arena, the cameras were all waiting underneath the basket for the visiting team’s pregame shootaround. They pointed at Bronny James, son of NBA superstar LeBron James. Just a teenager in his second college basketball game, he comes with fame garnered from the name on the back of his jersey and a face that’s a spitting image of his father.

The cameras pointed at Isaiah Collier and Boogie Ellis too. As top NBA prospects, they came with their own name recognition too. NBA scouts lined the baseline as USC warmed up Sunday, envisioning a future for their franchise in the red-and-gold-clad talent in front of them.

And yet on the other end of the floor was a normal afternoon shootaround for Auburn. Auburn’s focus was not on the big names opposite them, but instead on how to combat what head coach Bruce Pearl regarded as the best backcourt Auburn has faced this season. To them, this wasn’t about the matinee names but instead just simply a basketball game.

“Does it get you a little bit more hyped up playing against good players? Yeah,” point guard Aden Holloway said. “Does it matter? No. Only thing that matters is just getting the win.

So in a 91-75 win against USC, Auburn’s guards stepped up against their more renowned counterpart. It was a statement for Auburn in a standalone game about what this team at its best is capable of.

Auburn at its best comes in hand with its efficient and effective point guard play. And Auburn’s own five-star freshman plus fellow point guard Tre Donaldson were that once again Sunday.

“Aden and Tre both being a freshman and a sophomore, knew Isaiah going up through the AAU ball and understood how special he was,” Pearl said. “And they also see where he’s ranked on draft boards and things like that. They always want to play well, but it’s the youngest position on our team and right now we’re just getting incredible point guard play.”

Holloway and Donaldson combined for 22 points and had 11 assists against one turnover.

It was the continuation of an elite stretch of play since Auburn lost to Appalachian State 14 days ago. In three games since, Holloway and Donaldson have combined for 78 points, 25 assists and two turnovers.

Pearl can’t get better point guard play than that.

It was once again the flashy play of Holloway hitting 3-pointers from the logo and a second straight weekend where he ignited the Auburn crowd going into halftime with a final possession long ball.

Holloway continued to break out the slump which culminated with the Appalachian State loss. After going 0-8 on 3s against Virginia Tech and Appalachian State, Holloway has made 50% (10-for-20) of his deep shots since.

His four 3-pointers and crafty ball handling Sunday made a point to the NBA scouts who were not there to watch him.

Donaldson’s steady hand is quieter. Scoring 8.2 points per game this season, his statistical outputs often don’t stand out like Holloway’s, but his role off the bench does not have any drop off from the freshman. His command of the offense shows in being among Auburn’s top four players in efficiency rating Sunday.

As Pearl described, Auburn’s duo is young, but doesn’t make the mistakes passing the ball an inexperienced guard often does.

In his post-game press conference, Pearl referenced back to Auburn’s loss to USC in Los Angeles last season. That day, Auburn turned the ball over 23 times. Auburn’s guards played poorly in that game 364 days ago. KD Johnson had six turnovers, Wendell Green and Allen Flanigan each had three. Donaldson had two.

Ellis was on last season’s USC team, but the Trojans’ backcourt is improved by adding Collier, who many draft analysts consider the top prospect in the 2024 NBA draft class.

So Pearl focused on taking better care of the ball.

“Same system. I emphasized that this week,” Pearl said after the win. “We took better care of the call. They shared it. They just shared it. They didn’t ball dominate it.”

Auburn only had eight turnovers total on Sunday. The only player with more than one was the ever-aggressive Johnson.

Entering Sunday, Auburn was already ranked in the top 10 nationally in assist-to-turnover ratio. It is the fourth-best SEC team by turnovers per game.

Point guard play is more than scoring. But right now, Auburn has the scoring. But right now, Auburn’s point guards are bringing the ability to run the entire offense.

Winning in March requires elite point guard play. Right now, Auburn has it.

Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at [email protected]