Nearly a week after Auburn’s 78-76 upset loss to Yale to suddenly end the 2023-24 season, head coach Bruce Pearl spoke to local reporters in Neville Arena to recap the season and look ahead to the offseason.

Below is a transcript of his press conference.

OPENING STATEMENT

I’d be preferring, rather than doing this season-ending press conference here in Auburn, I’d rather be doing some sort of a press conference prior to a game against UConn in Boston. But it didn’t work out that way. We’re still feeling the sting and the pain of not performing well enough in the postseason to advance. And yet, we all know that 67 teams are going to lose at some time before they want to. I’ve been on the other side of that upset so I know that’s what March Madness is all about. That’s what makes the tournament so exciting and so special and so rare. And in spite of losing Chad Baker-Mazara to a Flagrant 2 three minutes into the game, when you’re up 10 with seven to go, we’re in a pretty good spot.

We turned the ball over on a number of occasions and most of the stuff that we turned it over on is stuff that you would take. Like three of them I can recall, we got the ball into Johni really tight and he got stripped. Or Jaylin Williams on a duck-in, he dribbled it off his foot. We’ve seen him make that play a million times. Denver came off a double-stagger, got his jersey held and he got fouled, they didn’t call it and it turned the ball over. Tre throws it away going backdoor to KD on a play that wasn’t really designed for the backdoor. It was designed for KD to set a back screen and we just didn’t execute. KD got a rebound and pushed the break and turned the ball over. Not being the point guard, and we’ve seen it before. So just a lot of the mistakes and some of the stuff that reared their ugly head have happened over a period of time and were just kind of the sum of a perfect storm. On the other end, they either scored or got fouled every time. It was very, very difficult.

The fact that we could lose to Yale, the fact that we did lose to Yale — one of the things I’ve been really careful about in my postgame comments and will try to be careful today — is by providing too many excuses, I take away from what Coach said was maybe the greatest win in Yale basketball history. That we were the best team that they had maybe ever beaten.

And I believe him. To provide too many excuses takes away from the fact that they made shots and they made plays and they made their free throws and had an historic upset. I made the comment after the game. I’ll make it again. I thought that the flagrant 2 could have been a flagrant 1 and I don’t think a whole lot of people would have commented on it. Could it have been a flagrant 2? Yes, it could have been.

But three minutes into the game when there really wasn’t anything where we were having any problems on the floor with temperatures rising or things like that. I knew right there we were in trouble. I knew right there, because they had one great defender and we thought that they’d put that defender on Chad and therefore our point guards would have some freedom to do more things. But when we lost Chad and they had one great defender on our point guards, the only playmaking guard I really had left was Denver. And he did a great job. Denver did a phenomenal job.

But there was a reason why Chad-Baker was SEC all-tournament team. He was one of the best players in postseason in the SEC. I thought the fact that it was retaliatory, that five seconds earlier Chad-Baker got hit in the throat on a flagrant play that was missed, should have been taken into consideration. I just thought the finality of, you work all year long to put yourself in that position and then on a judgment call remove him from the game. I just thought it was too excessive.

At the same time, on the other side of the coin, we’re handling that with total accountability. Chad made a mistake. He should have never done it. He should have walked away. There were several times during the course of the season where he made the same mistake.

What a really difficult way to learn from that mistake. At the same time, I would also like to remind our fans and anybody listening that Chad owned up to that mistake. And he’s apologized for that mistake. And he’s taken responsibility for it, although the consequences were really, really significant. And he feels really bad. He’s struggling with that right now.

I’m just going to tell the Auburn family, while I know you’re disappointed, if somebody was messing with your son, you’d stand up for your son a little bit, wouldn’t you? Stop messing with my son. Stop it. He apologized. He made a mistake. And I’m calling you out. I’m not having it. For those on social media that want to continue, unfollow those people. Stop it.

Part of it, what happens is we get so excited as fans. My goodness gracious, this was a team that we enjoyed watching as much as anybody. It was a really fun team to watch. This was a team that was not a preseason Top 25 team.

I never said I thought this was a good team that had a chance to be very good. It turned out to be a very good team with a chance to be great.

Iowa State and Auburn were the only two teams that got into the top 10 that weren’t picked in the top 10 or top 25, which tells you that, I think, this team worked very hard. The fact that we could lose to Yale speaks volumes about the 27 games we did win. Probably at Appy State, maybe Kentcuky at home, but they played so very, very well. This team beat the teams they were supposed to beat almost every night. And for that, I compliment them and for that I’m proud of them, because they prepared. They trained. They worked very hard, and they played well together. Obviously, they were unselfish.

So it was a great season. They won a championship. The fourth team in seven years — the fourth different team in seven years — to win a championship in the SEC. SEC championship matter. They matter to me. I think they matter to our fans. I think they matter to the Auburn family. And I don’t know that anybody over the last seven years in the SEC can say that four different teams have won championships.

At the end of the day, if that’s not good enough, I don’t know what is. And our guys are a little sensitive to it. And here’s the last thing: I’m not asking anybody to kiss my ass, OK? I’m not. You want to write good things or say good things, great. I hope I’ll work really hard to earn those things. And I will give, at some point — maybe it’s in the future, maybe it’s in the past — I’ll give you reason to criticize. You want to criticize the Yale game, criticize the Yale game. Let’s tear it up. Let’s ask questions about the Yale game. I’ll try to explain why we lost that lead. Have at it. But this was a great team at Auburn and I’m very proud of them.

On a message to fans…

Well, I think what happens is people get disappointed, because their expectations change. And they should change. The expectations for Auburn basketball should be way higher than they were 10 years ago.

On approach to the transfer portal this offseason…

Man, there’s no advantage of being 64 years old right now and having done this since 1978. It’s completely different. We got beat, and we got home Saturday morning at 4:30 from Montgomery. My staff and I were in the office at 10. I had to set an alarm to get up and get in at 10 o’clock. We worked Saturday and Sunday, evaluating what’s in the portal and what might be coming in the portal and our own team. And would you be shocked to know I’ve been recruiting Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday? Got back late last night, and I’m leaving in an hour. So, it’s changed.

We’re not in control of everything. The combination of the NIL and the transfer portal and the automatic eligibility right away, that’s just uncharted waters for all of us. Like, an NIL agent could literally call anybody on my roster and offer them some sort of NIL deal somewhere else, and it’s no longer tampering. I can tell you, we’re not going to do that. Just because it’s legal, I promise you, we’re not doing that. And I’ll fire a guy that ever tries to do it. That’s just not what I believe in. And we don’t have to. You don’t have to do it that way.

So, we met with almost all the players, and we gave the players the opportunity to meet and things like that. Just to see where they’re at. And I feel really good about our meetings.

I want to congratulate K.D. on three years of being in the NCAA Tournament, a regular-season championship, a tournament championship — that’s a pretty good three-year run. It really is. What I anticipated in my meetings with K.D. was that our roster in the backcourt, particularly with Denver Jones returning, it’s gonna be a bit more of the same for K.D. In other words, coming off the bench, not quite being able to play as freely as he would’ve liked to play. There’s only so many minutes, only so much opportunity.

We just talked about the fact that: Would the joy of the game be more if perhaps he was someplace else and had more of an opportunity to do more of what KD does. Our discussion was really, really good. KD Johnson will return to Auburn to receive his degree when the time comes. He’s really close to his degree, and he perhaps could go someplace else and maybe get that degree in this next year. But he really wants to be a unit short. He wants an Auburn degree. So does his family. When he’s done playing wherever he goes and plays, we’re going to make that happen.

On how the team might look next season…

“That’s a great question. Between Dylan Cardwell and Johni Broome and Jaylin Williams and Chaney Johnson, man, those four guys gave us as good a front line as we would play against. We pounded that ball inside to those guys and they did inside-out things. I think with all four of those guys – Jaylin Williams was all-conference finally, right? Johni Broome was an All-American. Again, you talk about progress. You talk about player development. Let’s talk about player development. Johni Broome starts at Morehead State. He goes there as a freshman, he’s not very heavily recruited. No Power Five offers. He just goes down there and is the Player of the Year down there. Then his sophomore year, he leads them to some championships. He has two great years. Now he’s at Auburn. Will his game translate? Can he play? Is he athletic enough? Fast enough? Can he go in the SEC? All he does is be all-conference in the SEC first year, takes us to the second round. And then comes back and really wanted to be an All-American really badly. His efficiencies. He improved from 2. He improved from 3. He improved from the foul line. He improved his assist-to-turnover ratio. He improved defensively. As a result of his improvement and us finishing the regular season ranked in the top 10, he was one of a handful of guys that weren’t on the preseason All-American team that was on the postseason, end of the year. Progress. Work. Not crowned.

Again, with a chip on his shoulder, not the preseason all-league guy. But when the thing was over. So very, very proud of Johni. Dylan, if he played more, either Johni Broome or Dylan Cardwell could have been the defensive player of the year in my mind. When Jaylin Williams gets hurt, all of a sudden Chaney Johnson’s role changes, boom, we go to Georgia, and he’s lights-out and plays really well down the stretch of the rest of the season. Those four guys — we had the advantage on the front line almost every night. With the exception of Jaylin Williams — who was a top-75 high school player — Dylan Cardwell wasn’t, Chaney Johnson wasn’t, Johni Broome wasn’t. Not McDonald’s All-Americans. Not even Burger King.

So as a coach and a teacher and somebody who wants to talk about Auburn, that’s, to me, man, those guys have worked really hard and been loyal to Auburn. We’ll see what comes back there. Would love to have them all back. If we can, we’ll have another dominating frontline next year. That’s still got to work itself out. We just don’t know.

On incoming freshman guard Tahaad Pettiford…

It’s a really good time and a really good question. Tahaad’s not a point guard. He’s got the size of a point guard, but everyone assumed Tahaad was going to come in and be our point guard. He’s not. Tahaad is a scorer. He is an incredible athlete. He can make plays on both ends of the floor. He’s going to be one of the fastest, quickest, most explosive little guards I’ve ever had. But he’s not a true point guard. Can he play some? He might. I actually think early in his career, I think I’m going to try to play him off the ball and let him do what he do: get buckets. Get buckets. Which may help you understand why the roster has moved a little bit in the position it’s moved now.

On players making decisions on whether to come back…

I want to let the guys make these decisions when they and their families are comfortable making these decisions. Obviously, the sooner they make them, the better for both I think them and the program moving forward.

On transfer rules…

I don’t know what influence I have over change. I love the one-time transfer exception, I think it’s fine. If you’ve followed my career, I’ve always had transfers sit out. I love when transfers come in and sit out and then the following year they’re ready to go. Samir Doughty was a good example of that. I don’t think that you should — sometimes sitting out gets looked at as a penalty. Sometimes sitting out and you’re working your body, and you’re working on your game and you’re working on your academics. You’re really not sitting out, you’re just not playing. But now what we have created with the transfer thing is at the end of every year, everybody can stay and everybody can leave and there’s just no order to it. One great thing about being at Auburn: guys like it here. They appreciate the opportunity to play here. They love their school. They love the Jungle. They love and appreciate the support they get. So in this crazy world of NIL and portal, we have a huge advantage at Auburn. Huge. The kids want to stay. And they don’t want to stay just because of me, I guarantee you. There’s a lot easier coaches to play for than me. They want to stay here because they love Auburn and Auburn Family. That’s facts.

On whether center Johni Broome could come back…

Sure. Absolutely. It’s one of his options would be to come back.

On how NIL could be a factor in his return…

You’ve got to weigh what the NIL could be versus what being on a 2-way contract, or a second round, or Europe or things like that. That’s something his family is in the process of doing right now with Johni.

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