Auburn Basketball: 6 Takeaways from Non-Conference Games

Despite falling by a season-high 29 points to Florida State on Wednesday, the Auburn men's basketball team will enter conference play with a 10-4 record, its best since the 1990-2000 season.

While the Tigers have strengths and weaknesses, Coach Tony Barbee's team has given fans a good idea of what to expect against SEC opponents.

Let's take a look at things Auburn has shown during the non-conference portion of the season.

While Auburn has jumped out of the gate to a great start, the teams the Tigers have beaten aren't great competition.

Auburn's opponents this year have combined for a 74-96 record.

However, Coach Tony Barbee said the schedule was intentionally made easier at the beginning of the season to help the team gain confidence.

Saying that, when Auburn has played better teams, blowout loses has become a trend.

The Tigers fell to Seton Hall 81-59, Long Beach State 64-43 and Florida State 85-56.

Coach Tony Barbee has expressed disappointment in the Tigers rebounding game throughout the season on several occasions.

The leading rebounder on the team is forward Kenny Gabriel, averaging 8.3 a game.

Starting center Rob Chubb only averages 4.3 rebounds a game. Despite Auburn's three-man rotation for the position, Barbee has taken every chance to say Chubb must improve his game if the Tigers will be successful in SEC play.

Auburn is, however, out-rebounding opponents this season, averaging 1.2 more a game.

While the Tigers have put up impressive numbers offensively in most games this year, they need to play better in the second half.

Auburn has scored 503 points in the second half, opposed to 455 in the first half.

However, Auburn has also had a problem allowing less-talented teams hang around in the first half before eventually making a run in the second half.

Coach Tony Barbee has a theme for post-game conferences this season: He's unhappy with Auburn's defense.

It appears the Tigers could win a game 125-80, and Barbee would say their opponent shouldn't have scored so many points.

Auburn allows, on average, 64.6 points per game. That's not cutting it for Barbee.

In three of the Tigers losses, the team gave up over 80 points.

However, in games Auburn has won, it has averaged giving up only 59.1 points.

With Vanderbilt and Kentucky on Auburn's schedule in the next week, it'll be interesting to see if Barbee has forced defense into his team's mind, especially after allowing Florida State to score 85 points Wednesday.

Within two minutes of Auburn's first exhibition game, forward Kenny Gabriel had already dunked a missed shot off the back rim.

Fans went crazy.

The high-flying Gabriel is one of the most exciting players in the SEC, if not the country.

He can make threes, pull down rebounds, block shots, has perfected mid-range jumpers and can dunk. Boy, can he dunk.

On any given night at Auburn Arena, there's a good chance fans will witness something that will be on Gabriel's highlight tape.

Not to mention, he's also a great player. Statistics back it up.

Gabriel leads the team in points per game (12.6), rebounds per game (8.1), steals (22), blocked shots (40) and three-point percentage (.400).

During the Diamond Classic in late December, ESPN's Stephen Bardo said Gabriel is "an NBA-ready player."

It's not always pretty, but Auburn has won every game at home this season.

The Tigers are a perfect 9-0.

Fan support has also backed the improved Tigers.

The 9,121-seat Arena has reached attendances as high as 7,128 this season.

The 1,500-seat courtside student section also hosted three consecutive sellouts for the first three games.

As Auburn continues to win, fans have taken notice and flocked to Auburn Arena. Last season, the Tigers played better with larger crowds.

The newly opened gym hosted three sellouts last year during a rebuilding year, but had at least 6,200 fans at each SEC game, two of which were won.