Cats lose regular-season finale against Auburn

The No. 16 Cats (23-6, 11-5 Southeastern Conference) failed to bounce back from their loss at No. 4 Tennessee with a 65-53 loss against the Auburn Tigers (14-15, 5-11 SEC) in Auburn, Ala., on Sunday afternoon.

Although UK already had secured second place in the SEC standings, and Auburn sat near the bottom of the conference, UK head coach Matthew Mitchell stressed the need for his team to get back to their winning ways before the SEC Tournament, which begins March 4.

But Auburn wasn’t going to let the visiting Cats spoil their Senior Day.

Down 27-21 at halftime, UK came out slow in the second half and let Auburn use a 7-0 run to take a double-figure lead.

Just past the midway point of the second half, Auburn had matched its largest lead of the game with a 15-point cushion over the Cats. UK went on a 10-0 run to cut the lead to five with 5:41 left in the game, but the Cats would be unable to get any closer the rest of the game.

Auburn received clutch performance from their two star players. Senior center KeKe Carrier finished with 13 points and seven rebounds, but it was the Tigers’ junior guard Alli Smalley who did most of the damage to the Cats. Smalley registered 26 points and six rebounds of her own.

Conversely, UK’s star forward, junior Victoria Dunlap, struggled all day to find her groove. Dunlap scored four points, her lowest total of the season, on 2-of-15 shooting from the field.

Freshman guard A’dia Mathies led UK with 20 points. 

Although the bench scoring picked up for the Cats in the second half, for the second straight game UK had zero points from players off the pine in the first half.

Also, UK lost the rebounding margin, 43-27, and made a trip to the free-throw line five times compared to Auburn’s 18 trips to the charity stripe.

On Jan. 24, the Cats defeated the Tigers 68-50 in Lexington.