Auburn will open the season against George Mason University on Monday night inside Neville Arena. George Mason is led by 2nd year head coach Kim English who previously served as an assistant under Rick Barnes at Tennessee. English and company enter this season coming off a 14-16 season with a 7-9 conference record in the A10. English had 8 newcomers on that '21-'22 team, and though they finished with a losing record, the team lost SEVEN games by one possession in his debut season. They are predicted to finish 5th in the A10 this season. Auburn and GMU have faced each other once before in 2017-2018 and Auburn came away with a 79-63 victory.
This year will be a bit easier on English as he returns 4 of his top 6 scorers from last year's team. One of which is the pre-season All-A10 big man Josh Eduro. Eduro stands 6'9 and emerged last season as a dominant scorer while leading the conference in PPG at 18. He also cleaned up 8 board per game to go alongside his efficiency on offense. Their top shooting threat is returning guard DeVon Cooper who shot 41% from behind the arc last season on 193 attempts. The last retuning starter is a do-it-all guard in Davonte Gaines. He finished last season with 10 PPG/8 RPG. English was successful in the portal this offseason picking up former Tennessee guard Victor Bailey Jr., NMSU PG transfer Saquan Singleton and lastly VA Tech transfer Ginika Ojiako. The other key guy to watch will be one of the highest rated signees in George Mason history. Justyn Fernandez was a top-150 recruit out of IMG academy. He's a 6'5 SF who can slash/shoot.
GMU was very efficient from 3 last season, averaging 9 made three point shots a game and hitting 280 for the season. You can expect them to have a quick trigger when an opportunity presents itself much like how Auburn runs its offense under Bruce Pearl. Eduro will work inside and out to hurt Auburn in the paint, but he does a good job of kicking out to open shooters when the defense crashes. English is expectingto play 9-10 guys, so they won't be afraid to press Auburn and make them run because they feel they have quality depth to run alongside AU.
English does have a deeper bench than last year, but it will take time for his team to gel. Auburn's trip to Jerusalem will pay dividends as this team has had a lot of time to work out some of their kinks. I think Broome versus Eduro will be a great first test and should make for some highlight worthy ball. Mason will have a size advantage at the guard positions and their PG is 6'6. Wen will need to work hard to make him uncomfortable and stay in front of him because this isn't a team you want to crash in on once they get inside the arc because they are capable of making you pay from outside. KD/Zep/AL will have their hands full with the GMU guards, but I feel AU's defense will be able to put the clamps on this team. AU may look a little rusty out of the gate, but I think we shoot the ball better than we did in the exhibition, and Broome works the paint well enough for us to find points when we get cold. Yohan could also have a coming out party early as they are relatively weak at the PF position.
Auburn 88
GMU 66
