It’s been a bit since Auburn’s men’s basketball team last beat the Florida Gators in Gainesville.

If you’re wondering exactly how long, Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl took the time to paint the picture during his press conference Friday afternoon.

“Steven Pearl was 7 (years old). Mike Burgomaster was 2 (years old). Chad Prewett was in his second year of coaching high school basketball. Ira Bowman was a player at Penn,” Bruce Pearl said, describing what each of his assistant coaches were doing the last time the Tigers beat the Gators in Gainesville.

To be exact, the last time Auburn beat Florida at Florida was on Feb. 10, 1996, which was 28 years ago — to the day that the 12th ranked Tigers are set to visit the Gators Saturday afternoon in a 2:30 tipoff from Florida’s Exactech Arena at the Stephen C. O’Connell Center.

On that Saturday 28 years ago, Auburn outlasted Florida 73-70 – snapping the Tigers’ five-game losing streak to the Gators when playing in Gainesville.

“Bill Clinton was president. Monica (Lewinsky) was still his intern. Gas was $1.22,” Pearl said. “And that was the last time we beat Florida at Florida. That’s a long, long time ago.”

The last time Auburn visited Florida was on Feb. 19, 2022, when Pearl and the second-ranked Tigers fell to the Gators 63-62.

The time before that, the fourth-ranked Tigers paid a visit to the Gators during the 2020 season and lost 69-47.

In 2018, Pearl brought a 12th-ranked Auburn squad to Gainesville, only to be beaten by the unranked Gators 72-66.

“It tells you a little bit about the history of Florida basketball, right? It’s as much a compliment to Florida basketball as it is anything, really,” Pearl said Friday. “I mean, I’ve not been able to go down there and beat them at Auburn. It’s a monumental task.”

Come Saturday afternoon, Pearl will get his his sixth crack at beating Florida in Gainesville as Auburn’s head coach. Should the Tigers escape the Sunshine State with a win, it’ll be a first for Pearl, who is in his 10th year at Auburn. .

And this time around, Auburn’s head coach will be visiting an arena that a former assistant of his calls home as former Auburn assistant Todd Golden leads Florida in his second season. Golden was previously an assistant on The Plains from 2014-16 before taking on a similar role at San Francisco, only to be elevated to head coach of the Dons’ program in 2019.

“He’s had great preparation,” Pearl said of Golden. “He’s a smart kid. He’s one of the best young coaches in the country.”

Last season, Golden led the Gators to a 16-17 overall record, a 9-9 record in the SEC and a first-round exit in the National Invitation Tournament.

Midway through this season — his second in Gainesville — Golden has Florida sitting with a 15-7 overall record and a 5-4 conference record, which features a 94-91 overtime win over Kentucky at Rupp Arena.

“I have thought, and I still think, that Florida is a sleeper. I said it pretty early on, not just because Todd Golden was my dear friend and former assistant, but I think they know it too,” Pearl said. “They’ve already played Kentucky twice. They’ve already been to Tennessee, and we’ve only got a two-game lead on them right now, and obviously we only play them once. It’s at their place this year. They’re in it.”

In visiting the Gators, Pearl not only sees a matchup that’s historically challenged the Tigers, but also a matchup that could challenge this year’s Tigers’ team – especially considering the size challenge Florida presents along the front line.

“They play two 7-footers. They’re really, really, really long,” Pearl said, referring to Florida’s Micah Handlogten and Alex Condon. “That’s the one thing, when we walk out there, they’re going to be bigger and taller and longer at almost every position.”

Florida’s Handlogten and Condon, both stretching over 6-foot-11, have helped the Gators’ rebounding efforts, especially on the offensive glass – a category in which Florida ranks inside the top-two in the nation with an average of more than 16 offensive rebounds per game, which only comes second to Texas A&M’s more than 18 offensive rebounds per game.

In addition to the Gators’ size advantage, Florida is also coming off a bye week, which Pearl calls “quite an advantage” for a team whose offense ranks seventh in the country when playing at home.

“They’re really good offensively. They run really good stuff,” Pearl said. “Their open-corner stuff is really good and hard to guard. They play with great confidence at home. They shoot the ball from 3 extremely well. They play really fast. They play really fast. We gotta get back in transition and see if we can get all five guys back and have a chance.”

And Pearl believes Auburn has just that: A chance to finally put the Gainesville voodoo to bed — even if it means beating a former, respected assistant of his.

“I want him to do well. I want Florida basketball to do well,” Pearl said, referring to the success of Golden. “And I want to beat the pants off of them on Saturday. I mean both.”

No. 12 Auburn’s visit to Florida will tipoff at 2:30 p.m. CT from Florida’s Exactech Arena in a game that’s set to be televised on the SEC Network.