Auburn men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl is stepping down as head coach and will be replaced by his son, Steven, the school announced Monday, Sept. 22.
Pearl, 65, coached the Tigers for 11 seasons and made two Final Four appearances. The 2024-25 team lost in the national semifinals to Florida and the 2018-19 squad lost to Virginia.
Pearl went 244-123 at Auburn and 706-268 overall across four stops as a head coach, including six seasons at Tennessee. He will move into an ambassador’s role with the school as special assistant to the athletics director.
“Eleven years ago, I was given the opportunity of a lifetime to become the head basketball coach at Auburn, and it has been nothing short of amazing,” Pearl said in a statement. “With the Auburn Family’s unwavering support, we have built a program from the ground up and taken it to heights it had never reached before. Not only have we won championships, but we have built the best home-court advantage in college basketball, we’ve invested in this community and changed lives, and we’ve developed and graduated Auburn men. We built a program with the core tenants of faith, family and passion, and together, we made history. I hope we have made Auburn proud.
