What Auburn basketball players said about having College GameDay in Auburn

If you’re an Auburn basketball player, coach or fan, Saturday is a day you circle on the calendar.

The No. 1 Tigers will take on No. 6 Tennessee in what will be a primetime showdown between two of the Southeastern Conference’s best teams. It’s arguably the best game of the weekend, garnering attention from the national college basketball media.

ESPN’s College GameDay will be live from Neville Arena Saturday morning, further illustrating how big Saturday’s game is. The show will run from 10-11 a.m. on Saturday, building anticipation for tipoff at 7:30 p.m.

Auburn’s players are used to raucous atmospheres and massive fan support at home, but veteran forward Chad Baker-Mazara recognized the extra attention that comes from having College GameDay on campus.

"It’s a little different with College Gameday because of what they do throughout the day," Baker-Mazara told reporters Friday. “But at the same time, we have fans -- they had to make a rule so people can’t camp out Thursday because people were ready to camp out as soon as our last game was over.”

For many games of this magnitude, Auburn students will camp out the night before the game to secure their spot in line for a seat. However, due to cold temperatures that won’t be allowed for this game.

Auburn guard Denver Jones didn’t try to hide his excitement either when asked about College GameDay coming to town and what the atmosphere could look like during the game.

“I’m going to be very, very excited. We’ve got the No. 1 fanbase on College GameDay,” Jones said. “I feel like that’s going to help us a lot. I look forward to getting a dub tomorrow.”

Even head coach Bruce Pearl acknowledged the magnitude of having College GameDay in town during his Thursday afternoon news conference.

“Excited about College GameDay being here,” Pearl said. “We’re the only school in the country that can say, at least at this point, that College GameDay has been on our campus five years in a row in college basketball.”

The show has now visited Auburn in each of the last five seasons it went to different campuses, not traveling during the 2020-2021 season due to COVID-19. Auburn is 2-2 in the previous four games that College GameDay visited.

Peter Rauterkus covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @peter_rauterkus or email him at prauterkus@al.com