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Auburn basketball: Starting lineup options for 2020-2021 season

By Cody Williams

AUBURN, ALABAMA - FEBRUARY 08: Devan Cambridge #35 of the Auburn Tigers reacts after their 91-90 overtime win over the LSU Tigers at Auburn Arena on February 08, 2020 in Auburn, Alabama. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
AUBURN, ALABAMA - FEBRUARY 08: Devan Cambridge #35 of the Auburn Tigers reacts after their 91-90 overtime win over the LSU Tigers at Auburn Arena on February 08, 2020 in Auburn, Alabama. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images) /
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Bruce Pearl of the Auburn Tigers (Photo by Wesley Hitt/Getty Images) /

Bruce Pearl and Auburn basketball followed up a Final Four appearance with another 25-win season. But what will the Tigers look like next season?

The last three years with Auburn basketball have been tremendously fruitful for head coach Bruce Pearl. After winning 26 games in the 2017-18 campaign but exiting in the Round of 32 of March Madness, the Tigers went 30-10 and made it to the Final Four in the 2018-19 season. The follow-up was obviously cut short by COVID-19 canceling the NCAA Tournament but they went 25-6 and finished tied for second in the SEC.

Perhaps the most impressive part of what Pearl has done with Auburn, however, is keeping the Tigers competitive both in the SEC and on a national level while experiencing turnover on the roster. No, he hasn’t been a one-and-done factory like many of his contemporaries but he has consistently brought in pieces to replace what he’s losing.

That will again need to be the case for Auburn basketball entering the 2020-21 season. Four of the Tigers’ five leading scorers from this past year — Samir Doughty, J’Von McCormick, Austin Wiley and Danjel Purifoy — were seniors and will be gone due to graduation. The fifth player of their team leaders, Isaac Okoro, is testing the NBA Draft waters.

So with the potential to lose their five leading scorers from the 2019-20 season, suffice it to say that Auburn could look substantially different than they did this past year when the next campaign tips off. But the question is how different this team will look and how well the Tigers replace the veterans that they lost.

At this point in the early offseason, there’s no guarantee what the Tigers’ roster and starting lineup will look like for the 2020-21 season. Therefore, we’re going to look at the best-case, middle-of-the-road case and worst-case scenarios for Auburn basketball and their starting lineup next year.