Winning breeds confidence, and the Auburn women’s basketball team is brimming with both.

After starting the season 1-4, the Tigers have won seven of their last nine games, including four in a row to hit their stride at just the right time of the season: the beginning of conference play.

Auburn opened up its SEC season with a big road win at Alabama on Sunday and now the 8-6 Tigers will host their first conference home game at 6 tonight against Florida (11-4, 1-0 SEC) at Auburn Arena.

And head coach Nell Fortner knows why her team is playing so well lately.

“I think just confidence,” she said. “I think we’re just kind of finding ourselves at this point.

We had a tough preseason schedule, and we had some losses. The thing we had to stress was we have to learn from the losses, we have to get better because of them, we have to find our weaknesses and improve upon them.

“I think this team has bought into that. We’re starting to find out who we are and that’s been nice to see.”

Auburn has won five out of the last seven meetings against Florida, which started its season 7-1, but has gone 4-3 in the last seven games. The Gators are also 0-4 on the road this season, which bodes well for the Tigers, as they are 13-4 at home vs. Florida in the series.

But stats don’t matter to Fortner, who knows how good Florida can be.

“Florida is always a very athletic and quick team,” Auburn’s coach said. “It’s always a good matchup between the two of us and I think that we play similar at times. We seem to have developed a little bit of a good rivalry. It’s always a close game — remember last year it was a double-overtime in Gainesville that Florida won. Then we came back and beat them in the SEC Tournament to move on in that tournament.

“They have good height, quickness and 3-point shooters, and we’re going to have to be ready for them.”

Florida is led by guard Jordan Jones, who is the only Gator starter to average double digits in points this season (10.7).

Auburn has two starters averaging double figures — senior guard Alli Smalley (12.6 ppg) and sophomore forward Blanche Alverson (10.8 ppg).

The Tigers have also been led by their defense, which is averaging 9.7 steals and 4.3 blocks per game. Auburn opponents average 19.7 turnovers per game with the Tigers scoring an average of 20.9 points per game off of turnovers.

In Auburn’s 66-55 win over Alabama, the Tigers held the Crimson Tide for more than 10 minutes without a field goal in the second half to build their lead to as many as 18 points.