LEXINGTON, Ky. — Auburn senior center Dylan Cardwell got to the private meeting room at the Marriott City Center at 10 a.m. sharp Friday morning, ready for a team breakfast to start a critical day of preparation. He looked around the room.
“It was me, the walk-ons, Denver Jones and Addarin Scott,” Cardwell said. “Everybody else no-showed.”
Cardwell was telling this story Saturday night in Rupp Arena, sitting in his stall in the Auburn locker room after a dominant second half — an Auburn-looking second half — delivered an 82-70 win over Creighton and the program’s first Sweet 16 appearance in six years. He was smiling. That was the vibe of the room. Loud chatter filled it. But understand, about 36 hours earlier, these people had Cardwell at his wit’s end.
Missing the team breakfast? Really? If this doesn’t sound like a big deal to you, at least acknowledge it’s a little off, which is a good way to describe Auburn’s play of late. Every moment spent together at this time of year matters. This isn’t early February at a Fairfield in Starkville. This is the NCAA Tournament.
“I was like, ‘We don’t care anymore. We’ve lost our fight and our care,’” Cardwell said. “And I called it out.”
No. 1 overall seed Auburn (30-5) advanced to meet No. 5 seed Michigan — and former Auburn point guard Tre Donaldson — in Friday’s South Regional semifinals because it had too many answers, too many matchup advantages, for No. 9 seed Creighton (25-11). Chad Baker-Mazara started driving Jackson McAndrew and he changed the game early in the second half, before departing after a shot to the hip (which he said would be “100 percent” in time for the next game).
Then Jones and Tahaad Pettiford started getting to their spots and dropping in too many shots for the Bluejays to match. Those three had 55 points, 23 for dazzling frosh Pettiford.
night, night auburn family 💤 pic.twitter.com/Lwxr4KnOzU
— Auburn Basketball (@AuburnMBB) March 23, 2025
“(Those three) absolutely got us, got us in space,” Creighton coach Greg McDermott said, and that made up for Miles Kelly’s 1-for-8 night. National player of the year candidate Johni Broome went 4-for-13 (still finishing with eight points and 12 boards), so Cardwell and Chaney Johnson teamed up for a double-double (14 points, 12 rebounds).
Auburn has a lot of answers. As we were reminded in the second half, stifling defense can be one of those answers. Some ball-screen gaffes helped Creighton splash nine triples in the first half and lead at the break. Auburn adjusted by switching more on screens in the second half rather than having their bigs hedge and try to recover to 7-footer Ryan Kalkbrenner.
That, along with exhaustive pursuit from Jones all night, held Creighton point guard Steven Ashworth to a garbage-time layup in the second half after he had 11 points, three triples and one “They can’t guard me!” declaration in the first.
“Denver Jones, I’ve been telling everybody, he is one of the best defensive guards in all of college basketball and he proved it tonight,” Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said.
“I’ve never played against anybody that runs as much as he does off ball,” Jones said of Ashworth. “He reminds me a little bit of Steph Curry because of how much he runs without the ball.”
But Jones can run all day, too. Auburn was too good. That’s the basketball explanation.
Cardwell’s response to the no-breakfast club, though, at least merits mention. This is a sportswriting staple, the “team meeting” that becomes a turning point in a season. If the results fit the narrative, the meeting gets brought up over and over again. If they don’t, it’s conveniently forgotten.
But hey, we like to try to take you inside, beyond the highlights and the news conferences. Here’s a little inside info on Auburn: Cardwell is this team’s leader. He cares a lot. He’s done worrying about the feelings of anyone who doesn’t demonstrate the same commitment.
That’s why Cardwell said on Auburn’s radio network after Thursday’s sluggish win over No. 16 seed Alabama State that the Tigers were “pissing away the opportunity” in front of them.
“You have the option to go out as the best team in Auburn history or the biggest bust in the country,” he said on the air. “At some point, it has to click. What more is it going to take?”
And that’s why untouched hotel eggs set him off the next morning.
“I can’t repeat what was said,” Cardwell said. “But it lasted like 10 minutes.”
This was right before a team film session, before the Tigers headed to Rupp for media engagements and a full practice.
“It was empowering,” Jones said.
“It was something the team needed,” Broome said.
“I said, ‘We’re gonna be on time to film, on buses, shootaround, study hall,’” Cardwell said. “We’ve been on time for the past 24 hours. Guys have bought in, they’re asking questions in film now. We’re just hungrier.”
Hungry for breakfast? Saturday’s breakfast?
“They beat me downstairs,” Cardwell said. “It was exciting to see.”
Maybe Saturday’s takeover was an inevitability given the talent disparity, and maybe it just delays Auburn’s “bust” destiny — this tournament is a giant disappointment if the Tigers don’t at least win two games in Atlanta and make it to San Antonio. But that’s a bit dismissive of Creighton.
McDermott was going for his fourth Sweet 16 in the past five seasons, with some players who have done a lot of that winning. Two of them are married. This is an old, poised team, and McDermott is every Midwestern high school athletic director ever.
Auburn, on the other hand, is always at least flirting with turmoil. If the Tigers win it all, they won’t just be Auburn’s first champion, they will be college basketball’s first champion … to have prompted a pilot to turn a flight around because of players fighting each other.
Volume’s high with this group, and Pearl is the beloved local pawn shop owner who drives a cab on the weekends and calls in daily to a sports talk show to yell about things.
Here’s what Bruce from Boston said about his team Saturday night: “We played like the No. 1 team in the country. We acted like the No. 1 team in the country. We prepared like the No. 1 team in the country.”
They enjoyed some orange juice and sausage links together, too, as a team tends to do during the NCAA Tournament. The guy who made sure of that looked around a very loud room Saturday night and pondered another few French toast sticks earned.
“I’m not ready to leave these guys,” Cardwell said. “They’re not ready to leave me. It means the world to me. Everybody’s funny, everybody loves each other. Man, it’s just great to be on this team.”
(Photo: Jordan Prather / Imagn Images)
