Auburn basketball’s regular season resume speaks for itself sitting as a guaranteed No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament.

After dropping its final two regular season games to conference opponents, the Tigers enter the SEC tournament with a shot at clinching the No. 1 overall seed.

Now ranked No. 3 in this week’s AP poll, ESPN men’s basketball Bracketologists Joe Lunardi believes Auburn will be the No. 1 overall seed regardless of their results in the conference tournament.

“I think if Auburn were to lose their quarter final on Friday and, you know, Duke or Houston were to blitz their respective tournaments, there will be a lot of talk about elevating one of them to No. 1 overall,” Lunardi on a media call Wednesday afternoon.

“At the end of the day, 20 Quad I games, 16 Quad I wins, half of them in Quad I A, which is the top half of Quad I. It’s like we haven’t seen a resume like this since Kentucky 38-0 to the final four and 10 years ago.”

Duke jumped Auburn for the top spot in the AP poll. Houston passed Auburn, moving up to No. 2 from No. 3. Seven SEC teams were ranked in this week’s poll, with four landing in the top 10.

Auburn coach Bruce Pearl spoke on how all the games during the SEC Tournament will be Quad I matchups. The Tigers will start tournament play Friday facing either Ole Miss, Arkansas or South Carolina.

“We’ve won two SEC Tournament championships in Nashville over the last five years. That’s not going to get it done for us this year,” Pearl said Wednesday.

“For me, what I would point to is this, which is really incredible: 13 of the 15 opponents that we would face in the tournament will be Quad I games. There are 13 Quad I opportunities out there, which speaks to how good the league is and what an incredible tournament it will be.”

Finishing the season with a 27-4 regular season record, headlined by the most Quad I victories in the country. Lunardi says the Tigers will be a prohibitive Final Four favorite.

“So, I still believe that Auburn’s name is going to be the first one called on Sunday night,” Lunardi added. “I suppose there’s a scenario in which they’re the second or even third No. 1 seed, but they’re going to be a No. 1 seed.

“If whatever loss they were to take on Friday were to have happened like the second week of December, we wouldn’t even be having the conversation. The committee has made it very clear, whether we like it or not, that games in November mean as much, if not more, than games like this coming Saturday and Sunday, and they’ve seeded teams by that, criteria.”

Jerry Humphrey III covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Jerryhump3 or email him at [email protected].