Auburn’s 79-73 loss to Florida in the Final Four on Saturday night in San Antonio left Charles Barkley disappointed but not surprised.

The Tigers led 46-38 at halftime, but saw its season end behind a second-half barrage by the Gators. Barkley said at halftime that Bruce Pearl’s Auburn team played a “perfect” first half, but they could not hold on.

“The best team won,” Barkley said in his post-game remarks on CBS. “Our guys played valiantly. It was a heck of a game. I’m so proud of our team, coach Pearl and those kids. Yeah, I’m disappointed, but Florida was the better team.”

Barkley was spotted hugging Pearl on the court after the game:

The difference-maker in the game was Florida’s All-America guard Walter Clayton, who scored 34 points — 20 in the second half.

“Don’t say more and don’t say less, Mr. Clayton is the real deal,” Barkley said. “(NBA analyst) Mark Jackson always says ‘mama, there goes that man.’ He is the real deal. He kept them in it when they were struggling, and then the rest of the guys joined the party. Congratulations to the Florida Gators. And I just want to thank my guys at Auburn for getting us to the Final Four.”

Nevertheless, Barkley said Auburn could have stood to be more aggressive after halftime. The Tigers seemed content to stay in their half-court offense, even as Florida scored 11 straight points to erase a 9-point Auburn lead early in the second half.

Auburn big man Johni Broome scored just three points in the second half after posting 12 in the first half, with Florida’s front line of 6-foot-11 Alex Condon, 6-10 Rueben Chinleyu and 6-9 Thomas Haugh combining for just 18 points but 20 rebounds. The Tigers got 18 points from guard Chad Baker-Mazara, but shot just 33% in the second half and made only seven of 25 attempts from 3-point range in the game.

“Auburn got lulled to sleep,” Barkley said. “Coach Pearl didn’t want to get in a run-and-gun situation. You could tell when we were walking the ball up the court and going to Broome … they just wore him down with the three big guys.

“I thought the biggest problem with Auburn was our guards, because they could have sprinted out and got some fast breaks. But they had already been told ‘don’t get in the fast break.’ I thought we should have changed our strategy in the second half, get into a run-and-gun contest with them. Because we didn’t get any easy baskets. … I wish we should have played a little faster. I thought our guards played sluggish.”

Florida will face the winner of Saturday’s late game between Houston and Duke for the national championship on Monday night.