Player of the Week
Jabari Smith– Forward, Auburn
The True freshman played a huge part in both of Auburn’s wins this week. Smith scored 20 points against Central Florida on 6-12 shooting, while hitting three of his six attempts from deep. Smith also grabbed seven rebounds and had three steals. He followed this up with 17 points and seven rebounds against Yale. Smith has been incredible for Auburn averaging 16.9 ppg and 7.1 boards and a huge reason they are 7-1 so far this year. His near 2 steals per game and 82% clip from the line along with 44% from three are all reasons to be excited about his potential, along with his present. Smith is squarely in the mix now alongside Paolo Banchero and Chet Holmgren to be the top overall pick in the 2022 NBA Draft. And behind Smith, Auburn looks poised once again to challenge Kentucky, Alabama and LSU for Conference supremacy.
Who’s Hot?
Jaden Shackleford– Guard, Alabama
Shackleford shot with incredible efficiency from three this week. In two games He hit 11 threes on 17 attempts. In a huge win over Gonzaga, Jaden dropped a season high 28 points while hitting six threes and grabbing 9 rebounds. Shackleford is one of the most dangerous shooters in the conference, averaging almost four made threes per game. Bama has another huge match up coming up against Houston. This game should be very entertaining with two highly skilled teams facing off early in the season. Along with Jahvon Quinerly, JD Davison and Keon Ellis, Alabama’s guard corps is as deep and talented as any team’s in the nation.
Oscar Tshiebwe– Center, Kentucky
While they only played one game this week, Oscar was incredible. He dropped 20 points on six of eight shooting while also shooting 8-11 from the free throw line. Oscar also grabbed 16 rebounds in a dominant game posting a huge double-double.
Who’s Not?
Missouri
While they went 1-1 this week, their victory came over Paul Quinn. Sure, they dropped 91 points, but that should be a given against a team like that. They followed up this 91-point performance with an absolute stinker against Liberty. They only compiled 45 points and lost by 21. In that game, they shot 14-49 (28%) from the field, and 3-19 (15%) from deep. An absolutely horrible shooting night for them in a game that was winnable. They also played very little defense, and allowed Liberty to shoot just under 50% from the field and 40% from deep.
James Reese V- Guard, South Carolina
The senior guard had a very rough shooting week. In three games, he combined to shoot 7-24 from the field and 2-11 from deep. He’s a career 41% shooter and 34% from deep, so he can do much better than he has over the past week. Hopefully he can figure it out, because he really put up some brutal numbers this week.
Erik Stevenson-Guard, South Carolina
Another South Carolina guard on the who’s not list, as Stevenson has been very bad this week. For the season he’s averaging over 12 points per game. Against Rider, he dropped 10 points, but only hit two pf his nine shots which were both from deep. He followed that up with a 3-13 night where he was 2-10 from deep against Coastal Carolina. Against Georgetown, Stevenson played a season low 13 minutes and did have his best shooting night of the week. Going 2-3 from deep and 2-4 overall. For the week, he shot 1-6 from inside the three-point line. From outside he shot 6-20 from deep.
Top Five SEC Wins
1. Alabama defeats Gonzaga
Huge victory over Gonzaga, while on a neutral court Alabama posted 91 points on the number three team in the country. They played physical defense and held Gonzaga’s main scorers to low percentages. Besides Timme (who was 10-19), the rest of the starters combined to shoot 12-38 from the field.
2. Tennessee defeats UNC 89-72
Tennessee dominated a ranked UNC team and beat them by 17 points. Led by 18 points from Zakai Ziegler off the bench, as well as 18 from Santiago Vescovi. Kennedy Chandler was also sensational, dropping 14 points while dishing out 8 assists and grabbing five rebounds. Tennessee shot lights out from the field, hitting 54% of their shots, while also converting 9 of 20 shots from deep.
3. LSU defeats Wake Forest
Wake Entered this game 6-0, and the Tigers handed them their first loss in a 14-point win. Led by Efton Reid’s 14 points, LSU dominated Wake defensively, holding them to just 32% from the field. This was a great win for a LSU team that has been very good so far.
4. Georgia upsets #18 Memphis
Georgia is one of the bottom teams in the conference, but this was an incredible win for a struggling team. Memphis was a top ten team very recently and is filled with highly rated recruits. Georgia was led by 24 points from Kario Oquendo, and escape with a victory after a late three put them ahead. This win snapped a four-game losing streak.
5. Florida defeats Ohio State 71-68
Ohio State entered the season ranked, while Florida was unranked. The Gators escaped this tough matchup with a 3-point victory. While the Gators did not shoot well at all from the field, Tyree Appleby’s buzzer beater was enough. The difference in the game was free throw attempts, OSU was hacking and Florida outshot them by 13 free throws and made 10 more.