Bruce Pearl

Bruce Alan Pearl (born March 18, 1960) is a former American college basketball coach who most recently served as the head coach of the Auburn Tigers men's basketball team for 11 seasons. Quotes We’re excited about our group. First time since I’ve been at Auburn that we have a large portion of our team returning, about 70 percent. We’ve had to rebuild a roster every year except this year. I’m excited about the progress we’ve made. I’m excited about the lessons we’ve learned. I like the ways the guys are training. We know the league continues to get better and better, and I think we are a part of that. I think the whole concept of the foreign trip is one of the great rules the NCAA has. Since 1982 when Stanford University played in the Kirin World Games in Japan and was able to take that trip pretty much every four years, I’ve gone some place with my basketball team. The experiences those young men have are life changing. They get a passport to go to another part of the world to see somebody else’s history, and it has great impact on you. Some of these guys are going to play overseas. It does make that jump a little easier because they’ve lived there and they understand some of the similarities between our country and theirs. The educational component, from hospitals to museums, to concentration camps. In China when they were going from communism to capitalism, seeing some of the manufacturing and some of the changes. Just life changing experiences. From a basketball standpoint, the fact that we get 10 days to workout prior to our trip and then play these games, it gives us an opportunity to get together a little sooner. You get to teach a little sooner, get some things exposed, try some new things, learn more about this team and have this team come closer together with a shared experience. I’ve always, from 1982, had real tangible results on the basketball court the following year after a foreign trip. It just gives you an advantage. Certainly for the new players, just as much as returning players because new roles, new positions and to get a jump on allowing those guys to compete and establish those roles. I wouldn’t say it’s more of an advantage for the new kids than it is for everybody. Austin was the most physical player at the U19 trials and the fact that his motor always runs were two things that jumped out at Coach (John) Calipari and that coaching staff. I think the adjustments Austin would have made from last year to this year, he’s much quicker, and he’s much more explosive. He’s always been fast, but now he’s utilizing that speed to his advantage. I think the other thing to keep in mind is when Austin was at the trials, he was going against other U19s. He is going to physically stand out. When Austin was 17 and he’s going against guys who were 20, 21, 22, you can tell it was there but he wasn’t going to dominate in the SEC against some of our older players like he was able to go dominate against players his own age. It’s a combination, it’s a double edged sword. He’s doing great, and this is a family tradition for the Orr’s and the Wiley’s. Vickie Orr was an Olympian. His mom was an All-American here at Auburn and now this is the second time Austin has had an opportunity to wear that USA jersey. He was on the U17s in Spain and now the U19s in Cairo. It means an awful lot to him. It is a great, great thing for Auburn basketball. We’re trying to establish more history and tradition of guys playing in the Olympics situation like Chuck Person did and Charles Barkley did. Quoting Bruce Pearl ... SEC Basketball Summer Teleconference, June 25 2017 External links Category:Basketball coaches Category:1960 births Category:Living people Category:Sportspeople from the United States