ATLANTA—Johni Broome wanted his South Region championship T-shirt. The rest of the Auburn Tigers already had them on, and he kept asking around the team’s celebratory cluster until he got one—it was too small. After a little more searching, he found one that would fit across his 6' 10", 240-pound frame.
As Broome slipped the gray shirt over his shoulders, a grimace crossed his face. No doubt about it, the right elbow that he injured with 10:37 left in the game against the Michigan State Spartans still hurt. Limbs aren’t supposed to bend the way that one did. But the pain couldn’t pierce his joy in the aftermath of a 70–64 victory that sends Auburn to the Final Four—one of a quartet of No. 1 seeds advancing to San Antonio.
“I feel great,” Broome said on the floor afterward.
The scariest moment of the tournament came and went without serious injury to one of the two best players in the college game. Broome’s elbow torqued awkwardly when he fell after defending a Frankie Fidler drive, and he stayed on the floor for a long time—sitting up and holding his arm against his body. A previously raucous State Farm Arena crowd that made this a de facto Auburn home game went silent.
A three-star recruit who received no interest from high-major programs coming out of high school in Florida had become one of the most valuable players in the sport. Losing him at that juncture looked like a catastrophe for the Tigers.
“My heart dropped,” said Broome’s Auburn teammate, Chaney Johnson. He had a lot of company.
When Broome got to his feet, he exited the court with Auburn medical staff. On the way to the locker room, he stopped to speak briefly to his father, John, and mother, Julie.
“I heard something pop in my arm,” John Broome says his son told him. “So I was like, ‘Oh, my goodness.’ I was terrified for a second.”
John and Julie accompanied Johni to the locker room where he was examined. The news from Auburn’s team doctor was better than they feared.
“I saw the screen, everything came back negative,” John Broome says. “And I started smiling again.”
After having his arm wrapped, Broome returned to the bench. The arena erupted at the sight of him.
“Are you good to go?” Auburn coach Bruce Pearl asked.
“I am,” he responded.
“Well, get your ass back in there,” Pearl said.
At the 5:29 mark, Broome reentered the game. He’s already an all-time Auburn hero on par with Charles Barkley and Chuck Person, but he took it up another notch with what happened next.
At the 5:03 mark, Broome snatched a rebound one-handed, his 13th out of 14 for the game. And 23 seconds after that, the 27% three-point shooter loaded up one from the wing and swished it for the last of his game-high 25 points. The Tigers led by 12 at that point, and the Final Four was within their grasp.
Legendary stuff.
“Talk about delivering again at the biggest moments,” Pearl said.
Pearl said Broome will be further evaluated Monday. For now, there is no fear that Broome will not be able to play in a Final Four game Saturday against the Florida Gators. With a week of treatment, he might even be 100%.
“I think we won’t really know until tomorrow and see what that was,” Pearl said. “Whether it’s a slight hyperextension or whatever it was, obviously the doctors were able to examine it and determine that there was no damage. I bet you it will be pretty sore tomorrow, though.”
As terrifying as it was to lose Broome at that juncture of such a big game, Auburn showed it is much more than its leader in points, rebounds and blocked shots. The fans might have had the air knocked out of them, but among the players, nobody blinked. “Next man up,” said fellow senior Dylan Cardwell. “We got seven minutes to get the national championship. So I didn’t really care much.”
During those initial five minutes without Broome on the floor, the Tigers lost only one point off their lead. They continued to guard and rebound like madmen, harassing the Spartans into making just 34% of their shots and 30% of their threes. Auburn was the far better team with Broome on the floor, but it could also hold its own against the Big Ten champions without him.
“I felt like I had better players [than Michigan State],” Pearl said. “That’s not a criticism at all.”
Auburn’s length, athleticism and tenacity on defense pushed the Spartans onto the perimeter and largely kept them there in the game’s opening stages, as the Tigers hit them with a 17–0 run for a 23–8 lead. Michigan State is the No. 318 team in the nation in accuracy from three, which is why it takes only 32.9% of its shots from behind the arc. But against Auburn, the Spartans launched 12 of their first 21 shots from three (57%), a warning sign.
“They were icing the ball screens on us, and then when we drove, we see four or five guys coming at you,” Michigan State guard Jase Richardson said. “They rotated really fast. They were defending really well.”
Said fellow guard Jaden Akins: “You drive, and they’re coming over the hill.”
Speaking of over the hill: With his receding hairline, lack of vertical leap and sometimes gimpy gait, Broome resembles an old man. In reality, he’s only 22, but he’s also played 162 games across five seasons at Morehead State (two years) and Auburn (three). He played his first college game when Cooper Flagg was 13 years old. Broome has pretty much seen it all, except what a Final Four looks like. Now that box will be checked.
With a handful of confetti stuffed under his championship hat, Broome was the final player up the ladder to finish cutting down the net. He snipped the last threads and hung it around his neck, and still was wearing that precious necklace when he arrived for the postgame news conference. He also had an ice bag taped to that right elbow.
“To stand on top of the ladder in front of all the Auburn fans,” Broome said, “and looking down and seeing my teammates, the whole Auburn family, it just means the world to me.”
