The grind of the college basketball season comes for even the best teams and best players in the country, and especially in a conference that, as Bruce Pearl said, is the single most physical he has ever coached in. 

As a result, there hasn’t been time for Auburn superstar Johni Broome to take it easy after a left ankle sprain that sidelined him for two games. Broome has been back for Auburn’s last five games and is still playing at the level of a national player of the year candidate, but he’s also visibly favored that ankle a few times.

Pearl has ensured that Broome is not at risk for any further injury, and that he wouldn’t be playing if he was. But it would be false for Pearl and Broome to say the All-American big man is at full speed.

“He’s getting better, but the ankle is not 100 percent,” Pearl told reporters Monday. “He’s at no risk for injury — not much of a greater risk for injury, but he’s not able to push that off, and we have to do a little bit of load management with him.”

With Auburn — still ranked No. 1 in the AP poll Monday after a 90-81 loss to newly ranked No. 3 Florida — obviously hunting the biggest possible prizes this season, Broome is the Tigers’ most valuable piece in those championship aspirations. He knows that, and communicated to Pearl that sitting out additional time was never on the table.

“He’s not complained one iota,” Pearl said. “I’m telling you right now: I could only speak for Johni, but I do imagine that there are other players — let’s even say maybe on my roster — I would just say even on other rosters, who have accomplished as much as he would have accomplished, who was in running for national player of the year, who could say, ‘Coach, let’s wait a couple weeks until I’m 100 percent because I’m worried I may not look my best and it may hurt me in my draft status. 

“Auburn family: not one ounce of that from Johni Broome.”

Broome has averaged 19.0 points, 11.6 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 2.8 blocks in the five games since his injury. The only setback that could be argued is his inside shooting, which is 43.8 percent from 2-point range compared to 61.2 percent in all prior games. 

Auburn as a team has had some issues finishing around the rim of late, including just a 14-of-29 mark on shots at the basket in the loss to Florida. On that subject, Auburn has now shot below 50 percent from 2-point range five times over its last six games after only doing so three times in the first 17 games of the season.

Pearl also mentioned that Chad Baker-Mazara has been dealing with some dings and bruises after he played just 19 minutes against Florida and had a couple hard falls.

“Chad’s been really banged up,” Pearl said. “He’s been banged up also. We don’t like to specifically talk about that, because he’s already a pretty big target. So, I don’t want to talk about some of the bumps and bruises and things that he’d in the training room for. But when you’re 180 pounds and playing in a game, in (what is) without question the most physical league I’ve ever seen. And I’m 64 years old. I’ve never seen the league this good, and I’ve never seen it this physical.”

Auburn heads to Vanderbilt for a quick turnaround Tuesday night (6 p.m. CST, SEC Network) before the first 1-2 game in SEC basketball history Saturday afternoon against No. 2 Alabama.

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