Although Auburn’s mens basketball team scored the first 7 points in its game against Rutgers on Saturday, the Tigers somehow managed to drop yet another contest, as they fell to Rutgers, 63-54, in the SEC-Big East Invitational in Pittsburgh.

Kenny Gabriel led Auburn’s fight with a game-high 18 points, while Earnest Ross notched his secound doulbe-double this season with 15 points and 10 rebounds. Dane Miller led Rutgers with 17 points and 10 rebounds, while Jonathan Mitchell added 14 points and James Beatty added 13.

Despite a quick start, the Tigers fell behind quickly late in the first half and had to try to claw their way back into the contest in the final 20 minutes.

“I was proud of them the way they fought back,” Auburn head coach Tony Barbee said. “The issues we are having is believing that you*re supposed to win the game. It doesn*t mean that you are going to win them all, but you have to believe.

“It was a three-possession game with a minute and a half to go,” Barbee added. “That*s an eternity, and we have guys with their heads hanging. They just don*t understand that the game is never over until that final horn.”

The Scarlet Knights, however, didn’t make their first field goal of the day until Beatty’s 3-pointer seven minutes into the game. The basket ignited a 15-0 Rutgers run to put it up by 8 points with just under 10 minutes remaining in the first half. Auburn (3-5), meanwhile, then went scoreless for nearl the next five and a half minutes.

Rutgers (6-2) led by 5 points at the half and then scored the first 8 points of the second period to increase its lead.

Auburn closed to within 39-32 with 13 minutes remaining but then went scoreless for more than seven minutes, allowing Rutgers to extend its lead to as many as 17 points.

The Tigers went on a 16-6 run to get within 7 points with 1:34 to go, but it simply wasn’t enough on the offensive end to slide past Rutgers.

“We didn*t get outrebounded, we got dominated on the backboard,” Barbee said. “We played well enough defensively to win this game. We held them to 33 percent, and they had 17 offensive rebounds. If they just get half of those offensive rebounds, we win the ballgame.”