02/25 at 11:04 PM

Tony Barbee wants to make one thing clear to any team that calls him its head coach.

Nobody’s job is safe.

“The best players for me play every single year. There’s no seniority,” Barbee said. “I’m going to bring in players every year that are going to be able to help our program. And if you are a sophomore, junior and senior and you’ve been in this program a year, or two or three, and I bring in a freshman or a new player and he’s better than you because you didn’t work as hard as you were supposed to during the season, during the offseason, to get stronger, to improve your skills. If you didn’t, it’s not on me that that guy beat you out.

“It’s on you.”

The bright side for Auburn (9-18, 2-11 SEC) as it goes through the gauntlet of growing pains in its first year under Barbee is the fact that it has no seniors on its roster and will enter next season pretty much intact.

Add in the three freshman signees and injured guard Frankie Sullivan and the future starts to get even brighter.

Add in major-college transfers Noel Johnson (Clemson) and Varez Ward (Texas), and it can lead to some pretty heady expectations.

“I’m going into next year with the mind of winning the SEC,” Ward said. “I know our team’s real young this year and they got a chance to grow on their own without having a senior leader out there or anything like that. I’m trying to win the SEC next year and win the tournament.”

Not so fast.

There’s still the final three regular season games — starting with Arkansas (17-10, 6-7) today at 12:47 p.m. — and the SEC Tournament to deal with this year, then all the offseason conditioning and preparation for next season.

And nobody’s spot is guaranteed.

“I don’t decide who plays. When you hit that practice floor, that’s where it’s decided,” Barbee said. “And if there’s a freshman better than that senior, that’s on you. That’s not on me.”

Ward and Johnson have both been practicing with the team since their transfers.

Ward, a former Jeff Davis standout, has taken things slow as he recovers from an injury that cost him last season after playing only three games.

The 6-foot-2 guard says he’s about 80 percent, but expects to be fully healthy by the summer.

The Montgomery native grew up an Auburn fan — idolizing Doc Robinson so much he wears his number 50 — but Auburn never came calling when it came time for choosing colleges.

“I was one of the top players in the state, and I never got recruited by Auburn or Alabama,” Ward said. “And UAB came in kind of late.”

Ward averaged 4.4 points and 1.6 assists in 35 games at Texas, even cracking the starting lineup as a sophomore before his season-ending injury.

But with Barbee, who recruited him out of high school, taking over at Auburn and his mother in Montgomery experiencing heart health troubles, the move seemed like a good fit.

“She might have a couple weeks where she’s doing good and then a week where she’s not doing all right, but for the most part she’s been doing pretty good,” Ward said. “It makes it a whole lot easier because now I can go home anytime, whereas when I was out there at Texas I had to catch a flight, so it’s a whole lot easier.”

Johnson, a 6-6 swingman out of Fayetteville, Ga., also had close ties with Barbee, who knows Johnson’s father, Lynbert, and Auburn assistant coach Milt Wagner.

He averaged 4.4 points and 1.8 rebounds in 39 games with Clemson, but found his playing time and impact lessened under new coach Brad Brownell. So he transferred to Auburn at the beginning of the year.

“I see a young team I can come in and help and hopefully win championships in the next year or the year after that,” Johnson said.

Both Ward and Johnson have had to deal with practicing all year without the “carrot,” as Barbee puts it, of playing in a game as their reward.

Barbee said how they react to the transfer year will be crucial for both players, like it was for Louisville transfer Derrick Caracter when he came to UTEP.

Barbee said Caracter did all the right things. That led to him becoming an All-Conference USA player, who now plays for the Los Angeles Lakers.

“I coached him just like I coached my five starters the year he was sitting out,” Barbee said. “When you’ve got a transfer like that, who’s got to sit a year, it can’t be a wasted year. It’s got to be a year of gain where they get better.”

Because in Barbee’s system, if you’re standing still, you’re probably getting passed.

“They made this year’s team better,” Barbee said of Johnson and Ward. “You’re competing every day against our first-team guys, or guys that are in the rotation, I want you competing and challenging and making them better. They’ve done that. They’ve helped us with the biggest improvements we’ve made on our team.”

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Arkansas (17-10, 6-7) at Auburn (9-18, 2-11)

Where: Auburn Arena

When: 12:47 p.m.

Radio/TV: WKKR (97.7 FM)/SEC Network (Channel 8 and 12)

Projected starters, Arkansas: F Delvon Johnson, 6-9, Sr. (9.6 ppg, 7.4 rpg, 3.3 bpg); F Marshawn Powell, 6-7, So. (11.1 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 0.8 apg); G Marcus Britt, 6-3, Sr. (4.8 ppg, 1.8 rpg, 1.2 apg); G Rotnei Clarke, 6-0, Jr. (14.3 ppg, 3.1 rpg, 1.3 apg); G Jeff Peterson, 6-0, Jr. (6.7 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 2.5 apg)

Projected starters, Auburn: F Allen Payne, 6-6, Fr. (6.0 ppg, 3.1 rpg, 1.0 spg); F Kenny Gabriel, 6-8, Jr. (9.6 ppg, 5.7 rpg, 1.0 bpg); F Adrian Forbes, 6-8, Jr. (3.8 ppg, 2.7 rpg, 0.6 bpg); G Josh Wallace, 5-10, So. (5.5 ppg, 2.2 rpg, 3.8 apg); G Earnest Ross, 6-5, So. (13.4 ppg, 6.6 rpg, 2.3 apg)