Memphis basketball will face SEC powerhouse Auburn in an Oct. 30 exhibition game at State Farm Arena in Atlanta, the schools announced July 29.
The game is scheduled to tip off at 7:30 p.m. It will be preceded by an exhibition game between the North Carolina and South Carolina women’s basketball teams (5 p.m. tip-off).
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It will be the final tune-up for coach Penny Hardaway’s Tigers before the 2025-26 regular season gets underway. Tickets will go on sale at 9 a.m. on Aug. 8.
Memphis is also expected to entertain coach John Calipari and Arkansas in a charity exhibition game at FedExForum in October. That game will mark the first time Calipari has faced the team he coached for nine seasons since leaving the Tigers for Kentucky in 2009.
Last season, Hardaway set up preseason games against North Carolina and Alabama to help prepare his team for a rigorous regular-season non-conference schedule.
The Tigers also have recent history with Auburn. Memphis faced coach Bruce Pearl’s Tigers Nov. 27, 2024, in the Maui Invitational championship game. Auburn won 90-76 en route to a Final Four appearance.
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Speculation regarding his future as Auburn’s coach has swirled around Pearl this offseason. His name has been floated as a potential candidate for Tommy Tuberville’s vacant U.S. Senate seat in the state of Alabama. While Pearl has not publicly addressed it, Auburn athletic director John Cohen weighed in on July 15.
“Can things happen? For sure, but yeah, my expectation is for him to be coaching for us,” he told The Montgomery Advertiser.
Either way, Memphis’ matchup against Auburn should provide Hardaway another opportunity to gauge how his entirely new roster stacks up with one of the county’s elite programs over the past two seasons. The only player Auburn returns from last season is guard Tahaad Pettiford, who put together a star-making freshman campaign. But Pearl has rebuilt with high-level transfers, including Keyshawn Hall, KeShawn Murphy, Abdul Bashir and Kevin Overton.
Hardaway has also overhauled his roster again, adding Dug McDaniel, Sincere Parker, Aaron Bradshaw, Zachary Davis and more.
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Memphis’ loaded preseason slate serves as a prelude to a likewise stacked regular-season non-conference schedule. The Tigers have one non-conference opponent that has not yet been announced. But most of the non-conference slate is already in place − and, like last season, it sets up to be among the strongest in the nation:
Home games: San Francisco (Nov. 8), UNLV (Nov. 16), New Orleans (TBA), Southern Illinois (Nov. 26), Baylor (Dec. 6) and Vanderbilt (Dec. 17).
Away games: Ole Miss (TBA), Louisville (Dec. 13), Mississippi State (Dec. 20) and Utah State (Feb. 14, 2026).
Neutral-site games: Purdue (Nov. 20) and either Texas Tech or Wake Forest (Nov. 21) at the Baha Mar Hoops Challenge in the Bahamas.
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Reach sports writer Jason Munz at jason.munz@commercialappeal.com, follow him @munzly on X.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Memphis basketball to meet Auburn in preseason exhibition game
