Steven Pearl, Auburn Basketball Slammed in New SEC Coaches Rankings

The Auburn Tigers continue to be disrespected in men's basketball. Last season, the SEC got 10 teams inside the NCAA tournament, and unfortunately, Auburn was not one of them. They were team 11,  the last one to miss the tourney. Instead, Auburn still had one of the deepest postseason runs inside the conference and winning the NIT championship game, when the team could have easily opted out, new head coach Steven Pearl still finds himself fighting an uphill battle. 

On Monday, The College Basketball Report, a social media channel that claims to see college basketball through a different lens, dropped its SEC men's college basketball coaches' rankings heading into the 2026 season. Out of the 16 programs inside the Southeastern Conference, Steven Pearl found himself at the very bottom of the coaches' rankings. 

Pearl and the Tigers will quickly change these rankings when the season begins, and the disrespect will likely have no chance of continuing. A longtime assistant on his father's successful Auburn basketball teams, including a Final Four appearance in Bruce Pearl's final coaching season, Steven Pearl has found himself in an interesting situation. 

The fastest way to get people to respect you is to win basketball games. Auburn was very close to making the NCAA tournament in the first year under Steven Pearl. The program is clearly looking toward the future, though, as Steven Pearl and his coaching staff have done a great job building next season's roster through recruiting and the transfer portal. 

"I was incredibly grateful and thankful to all the guys we had on last year's team, but I think I realized the pieces I really needed in order for us to be successful." Said Steven Pearl, "We tried to go out there in the portal and find those guys." 

The upcoming Auburn men's basketball team roster will certainly look different this upcoming season, with only Tahaad Pettiford and Kevin Overton returning as key players from Auburn's rotation last year. It will bring a much more experienced roster, that will include size for the upcoming season, and that's believed to help the Tigers get over the hump and back into March Madness.