In SEC play, Johni Broome has become No. 16 Auburnâs closer
Two days before Auburn beat Arkansas by 32 points at Bud Walton Arena to open up SEC play, head coach Bruce Pearl told reporters that in order to win in this league, his best players had to be exactly that: Auburn’s best players.
The comment itself is relatively benign and generally logical. The good teams will win the biggest games when their best players play well. That seems self-explanatory.
But Auburn’s roster is unique. It is truly 11-men deep. Ten Auburn players average at least 14 minutes per game. Seven players average at least seven points per game. And throughout non-conference play, Auburn had seen a rotation of players step up on a given night with a big game. There may not be a true star on this team, which Pearl has described as successful as the sum of its parts.
Center Johni Broome, though, is No. 16 Auburn’s best player. If Auburn (18-4, 7-2) needed to lean on any one man in this cast of options, that player almost certainly would be Broome.
And as Auburn picked up its biggest win of the season thus far Saturday night, beating Ole Miss 91-77, Broome was exactly what Pearl said back at the beginning of January: Auburn’s best player being at his best.
Broome scored 15 points in the second half of Auburn’s win in Oxford, Mississippi, after not scoring at all in the first half.
“First half, I was scoreless,” Broome said on Auburn’s postgame radio show Saturday night. “My teammates stepped up for me and helped out in a big way, kept us in the game. Second half, they kind of relied on me a little more and I was able to make plays.”
When Broome stepped up in the game’s most important minutes, when Auburn fed him the ball on the interior, the offense clicked.
“Not everybody has Johni Broome,” Pearl said in his postgame press conference. “I’m saying, ‘Johni Broome, we’re gonna get it in to you. But you may get doubled, and they’ve got the shot-blockers. There may be some inside out.’ He was fine.”
But Broome’s surge in the second half has become a trend for Auburn throughout SEC play. He has gotten better as games have worn on — as Auburn has needed him more.
Over the first nine games of SEC play, Broome is averaging 3.7 points in the first half of games.
In the second halves? Broome is averaging 11.
Broome has scored zero first-half points in four of Auburn’s nine SEC games. In all four of those games, he responded with a double-digit point output in the second half. The fewest points he’s scored in the second half of an SEC game is nine.
Broome’s 14 points in the second half against Arkansas on Jan. 6 helped Auburn pull away to its blowout win. He had zero points in the first half of that game.
Broome’s 10 points in the second half against Texas A&M on Jan. 9 helped Auburn close out the Aggies in what is still Auburn’s best win of the season based on NET ratings. He had zero points in the first half of that game.
Broome’s 14 points in the second half against Mississippi State on Jan. 27 helped Auburn get back into the game and position his team with a legitimate chance to win on the road. He had zero points in the first half of that game.
Broome’s 15 points in the second half against Ole Miss on Saturday turned what looked to be the same story for Auburn on the road into one of its more impressive in-game turnarounds of the season. He had zero points in the first half of that game.
Three of Broome’s best second half performances of any kind this season have come in true road games.
“Johni Broome, I’m giving him a lot of credit for kind of hanging in there,” Pearl said on Auburn’s postgame radio show. “And then in the second half, who’s the biggest, baddest boy on the block? Johni Broome. At the end of the day, who’s the biggest, baddest boy on the block? It was Johni. They couldn’t handle him in there.”
Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at [email protected]