TUSCALOOSA — The first foul came a little more than 2 minutes after he stepped on the court.

The second was whistled less than 2 minutes later.

Just like that, Brendon Knox was back on the bench Saturday, behind the 8-ball.

Knox didn’t foul out for the ninth time this season in Saturday’s 73-61 loss to Alabama, but the early foul trouble he found at a sold-out Coleman Coliseum relegated him to an SEC-low 15 minutes.

The senior bigman had a front-row seat for the other 25, as Tay Waller and DeWayne Reed tried to shoot Auburn out of an early-game slumber that never went away against Alabama’s stingy perimeter defense.

“He can look like 100 bucks one night and just looks like he never played the next,” coach Jeff Lebo said. “When he plays well, it opens up so many things for us offensively.

“I’d fix it if I could.”

Alabama’s win vaulted it ahead of Auburn in the final Western Division standings because of a lengthy list of tiebreakers that went one step away from a coin flip. South Carolina’s 77-73 victory at Vanderbilt on Saturday ended up being the difference-maker, as the Gamecocks slid ahead of Georgia into fifth place in the Eastern division.

Because the Tigers (15-16, 6-10 SEC) lost to South Carolina and Alabama (16-14, 6-10) did not, Auburn will face Florida in the first round of the SEC Tournament on Thursday at 6:30 p.m. in Nashville, Tenn.

The job status of Lebo, who is now 35-61 against SEC opponents in his six years with Auburn, promises to be a hot topic at the Sommet Center, but Lebo said he won’t be focused on it during this week’s preparations.

“I don’t worry about that. I’m worried about my team,” Lebo said. “We’ve got to get ready for a game and that’s my plan and where 100 percent of my effort is going to be.

“We’ve got to get consistent play from everybody if we hope to do anything in the tournament.”

Knox’s consistency has been a problem all season.

He’s had dominant performances, such as his 22-point effort against South Carolina to open SEC play and his 21-point game Wednesday against Mississippi State, but he’s also had games such as his 2-point, 5-turnover effort at Tennessee and the one he capped the regular season with Saturday.

Knox, who finished with 6 points, averaged just 6 points per game in road conference games compared to an 11.9 average at home. Four of the six times he’s fouled out during SEC play occurred away from home.

The Tigers are just 2-6 in games he fouls out.

“That’s one of his Achilles heels,” Lebo said. “He gets fouls quickly and then he’s not particularly good when he’s playing with fouls. He’s got to be smarter at that point and is just not a factor in the game at all.”

With Knox on the bench, Waller and Reed started chucking, especially during the second half, when Auburn slowly saw the 1-point deficit it was chasing at halftime turn into double digits. Alabama’s 10-1 run with less than 5 minutes to play helped seal the Tide’s first win over Auburn in the past five meetings.

Waller finally simmered down after his recent hot stretch, finishing with a team-high 22 points while shooting 4-of-12 from 3-point range. He came into Saturday having shot 64 percent from beyond the arc and averaging 26.5 points over the past four games.

Reed had 17 points, but was just 5-of-19 from the field and took too many bad layups during the second half. He really didn’t have any other choice.

The Tigers are 4-15 whenever Reed attempts 12 or more shots. He was 1-for-10 in the second half Saturday.

“It was frustrating playing without an inside presence,” Reed said. “It was kind of hard for us and we had to force shots.”

Auburn’s only other inside threat, Lucas Hargrove, had one of his toughest games of the season, both on offense and defense.

The victim of merciless taunting from Alabama’s student section, Hargrove had just 3 points and 5 turnovers, while struggling to keep up with Tony Mitchell (16 points) and Chris Hines (13) on the other end of the floor.

“Lucas struggled,” Lebo said. “He had a rough day today.”

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