Style points were few and far between Tuesday night at Beard-Eaves-Memorial Coliseum.

Auburn beat Bethune-Cookman, 61-46, in a game that had little, if any, flow. An announced crowd of 3,254 subdued fans were in attendance to see the Tigers pick up their third win of the season in the second round of the Chicago Invitational.

The Wildcats pressed throughout most of the game and held the ball near the end of the shot clock on most possessions. Auburn didn’t really struggle with the Wildcats’ guard-heavy defense, but it didn’t exactly take advantage of it either.

“They had a funky press,” guard DeWayne Reed said. “Just funky.”

The funk didn’t necessarily translate into entertaining basketball.

Auburn turned the ball over 16 times and took just 43 shots from the perimeter. It shot 60 percent (14-of-23) from the foul line, with six of those misses coming from backup forward Brendon Knox.

The Tigers caused 12 turnovers but had zero fastbreak points.

“The best thing I can say about this,” coach Jeff Lebo said, “was that it’s a W.”

Reed led the Tigers with 14 points off the bench and played tight defense on Bethune-Cookman’s biggest weapon, Clifford Reed, who was just 3-of-13 from the field.

Clifford Reed’s performance mimicked that of the rest of the Wildcats, who shot just 30 percent from the field. Bethune-Cookman was picked to finish 11th out of 12 teams in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference and has not had a winning season since 1975-76.

Dayton, whom Auburn plays Friday, beat the Wildcats, 78-38, earlier this week.

“It was kind of like a pickup game,” Reed said. “They played sloppy and we kind of got sloppy with them.”

Tay Waller, Auburn’s leading scorer coming into the game, had zero points on 0-for-6 shooting. All six of those misses came from behind the 3-point line.

“He got some of his better looks of the year,” Lebo said, “so maybe they have to guard him better.”

Quantez Robertson was the only other Auburn player in double figures, with 12 points. His alley-oop assist to Korvotney Barber in the opening seconds gave the Tigers a lead they would never relinquish.

The Tigers slugged their way to a 28-16 lead in the first half, holding the Wildcats without a field goal for the final 4:18. The Wildcats didn’t sink their first field goal of the second half until Jarrell Thomas’ 3-pointer with 12:28 to play.

“Defensively, we were good enough, but offensively we shot the ball poorly,” Lebo said. “They played five guards on us and we had a hard time with it.”

Rasheem Barrett saw his first action since the season-opener and, with barely any practice under his belt, had plenty of rust to shed. In seven minutes of action, Barrett missed all three of his shots and grabbed two rebounds.

“He ain’t ready yet,” Reed said. “He needs some more practice.”

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