10.2 23 Football Articles

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saturdaydownsouth.com

 

Auburn football: Stock report after Week 5

Glenn Sattell | 15 hours ago

3–4 minutes

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Auburn did everything but cover Brock Bowers. And it cost the Tigers an opportunity for the biggest upset of the 2023 season. A 60-minute dogfight came down to Georgia’s tight end playing the hero, overcoming an Auburn effort that was good enough to beat most teams.

But it wasn’t quite enough to top the No. 1 team in the country. The 2-time defending national champions prevailed — no, escaped with a 27-20 victory at Jordan-Hare. Auburn played on even terms with the champs until it failed to cover their All-American tight end, who caught 5 passes for 111 yards in the 4th quarter alone, including the game-winning touchdown.

For the game, Bowers hauled in 8 passes for 157 yards.

Player of the Week: Marcus Harris

The senior DL had his name called throughout for making tackles and being around opposing ball carriers. He played an instrumental role in Auburn holding the Bulldogs to just 107 rushing yards.

Harris finished with 7 tackles, including 5 solo. He recorded a team-leading 2 tackles for loss as well as adding a pass breakup.

Freshman of the Week: Kayin Lee

The speedy DB from Ellenwood, Ga., can also be a hitter. Lee recorded 3 tackles, all solo, in helping the Tigers play solid defense against the nation’s top-ranked team.

Biggest surprise: Auburn hangs in the 2nd half

Georgia is known as a 2nd-half team. The Bulldogs have roared back in the final 2 quarters in more than 1 game this season.

But Auburn hung with them, playing on even terms with the defending champs after a 10-10 1st half until the final minutes, when Bowers and the Bulldogs made the difference with a late score. The Tigers made up with heart and desire the gap in Georgia’s extreme depth advantage.

Biggest concern: Why was Bowers running free in crunch time?

How did Auburn allow an All-American to run free in coverage during the most crucial time of the game? During one stretch late in the game, Bowers was targeted 5 straight times, making 4 catches for 94 yards. Then on the game-winning drive, he caught consecutive passes of 16 yards and the 40-yard TD.

Developing trend: 60 minutes of football

Regardless of the situation, regardless of the opponent, the Auburn Tigers are fighting for 60 minutes. They scored the first 10 points of the game Saturday and were tied 20-20 with Georgia as late as 3 minutes to play in the 4th quarter.

How many victories that translates to remains to be seen. But one thing is for sure: The Tigers will give opposing teams a fight from beginning to end.

Key stat: 313 passing yards

While Auburn stopped Georgia’s run game, the Bulldogs moved the football through the air, and that made the difference in the game. Georgia QB Carson Beck completed 23 of 33 passes, and that helped the Bulldogs convert on 8 of 13 3rd-down plays — another key stat.

First impression about Week 6: Open week

The Tigers (3-2, 0-2) have an open date next Saturday to heal some bumps and bruises. The physical game with Georgia left Auburn somewhat nicked up, and the Tigers will take the week to help heal some of those.

It’s also a chance to take an early look at Auburn’s next opponent, LSU. Auburn will be traveling to Baton Rouge for an Oct. 14 game at Tiger Stadium. LSU (3-2, 2-1) lost on the road to Ole Miss on Saturday, 55-49.

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si.com

 

Auburn's defensive PFF grades against Georgia

Lance Dawe

~2 minutes

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Auburn football's defense fought valiantly until the fourth quarter against the Georgia Bulldogs.

The Tigers had held UGA under wraps until the very end, letting Georgia tight end Brock Bowers run rampant and finding the endzone for the go-ahead score late.

There were some really good moments - a pair of turnovers that were immediately turned into touchdowns - but also some really bad ones, particularly in the backend against Bowers.

Here's how every Auburn Tiger graded out on Pro Football Focus against the Bulldogs.

Marcus Harris - 92.6

Jaylin Simpson - 91.8

Jalen McLeod - 71.9

Justin Rogers - 69.7

DJ James - 65.5

Nehemiah Pritchett - 63.8

Jayson Jones - 63.1

Caleb Wooden - 62.4

Donovan Kaufman - 62.0

Elijah McAllister - 62.0

Wesley Steiner - 61.0

Lawrence Johnson - 60.2

Stephen Sings V - 60.1

Mosiah Nasili-Kite - 59.9

Keldric Faulk - 59.4

Zykevious Walker - 58.9

Eugene Asante - 58.8

Kayin Lee - 56.8

Cam Riley - 48.7

Zion Puckett - 48.3

Larry Nixon III - 35.8

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auburnwire.usatoday.com

 

Third down the difference in Auburn's loss against Georiga

JD McCarthy

~3 minutes

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Hugh Freeze said it himself, third down was the difference between Auburn and Georgia Saturday in Jordan-Hare Stadium.

Auburn won the turnover battle, took a 10-0 lead and rushed for over 200 yards but their struggles on third down were too much to overcome as the Bulldogs won 27-20.

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“I think you look back at this game and you look at third downs,” Freeze said after the game. “Look at our third-down offense and our third-down defense. I think that’s where the game was lost for us.”

The Tigers finished the game just 2-of-12 on third-down attempts with both conversions coming in the second half.

Auburn’s offense had success at times but they were never able to get the passing game going. That was costly on third down when they were consistently backed up, needing to gain an average of 7.2 yards on their third down attempts.

Auburn picked up one third-down conversion through the air and one on the ground both thanks toPayton Thorne. He scrambled for 17 yards for one conversion and found Rivaldo Fairweather for an 11-yard gain in the fourth quarter.

He finished the game 2-of-4 passing for 15 yards with 26 yards rushing and was sacked once on third down. The Tigers attempted to run six other times on third down but were unsuccessful on each, averaging just 1.5 yards per carry.

They didn’t just struggle with third downs on offense, the Georgia offense had plenty of success on third down as quarterback Carson Beck was at his best when his team needed him the most.

Making the first road start of his career, Beck threw an early interception to set up Auburn’s first touchdown of the game but responded in a major way. Auburn’s offense did a great job holding Georgis to small gains on early downs and Georgia’s average distance to gain on third down was 7.4 yards. However, the Tigers’ defense struggled to make that final play as they converted on 8 of their 13 attempts.

Despite facing plenty of pressure from Auburn’s defense, Beck completed 8 of his 10 passes for 115 yards on third down and seven of his completions went for first downs.

Contact/Follow us @TheAuburnWire on X (Twitter), and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Auburn news, notes, and opinions. You can also follow JD on Twitter @jdmccarthy15

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al.com

Auburn football: Does Payton Thorne’s leash lengthen after game vs. No. 1 Georgia?

Updated: Oct. 01, 2023, 4:30 p.m.|Published: Oct. 01, 2023, 1:53 p.m.

7–9 minutes

Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze often finds himself having to remind his team of college-aged boys that growth doesn’t come from where they think it does.

“I tell them all the time, man: The growth, really — unfortunately in life and in football — the growth usually happens more in the valley than it does on the mountaintop,” Freeze said following Auburn’s heartbreaking 27-20 loss to the No. 1-ranked Georgia Bulldogs Saturday night.

And while all of Auburn’s football team was in the valley in last week’s loss to Texas A&M, perhaps no one found himself farther from the top than Auburn quarterback Payton Thorne.

During the third quarter against the Aggies last week, Thorne watched from the sideline as Robby Ashford and Holden Geriner took over the reins of the Auburn offense. Thorne had been benched midway through his first SEC road game.

The talk of the town following the 27-10 loss in College Station centered around what Freeze and the Tigers were going to do at the quarterback spot moving forward. It seemed like everyone outside of Auburn’s locker room had come to the conclusion Thorne wasn’t the answer.

Even former Auburn basketball player Charles Barkley sounded off on the matter and said Auburn should “pray for better quarterback play.”

But Freeze’s opinion was the only one that mattered. And his leash hadn’t quite run out on the junior Michigan State transfer.

“We had a good meeting Sunday night and obviously, I feel like there’s things that our staff has let him down on also,” Freeze said during the SEC coaches’ teleconference on the Wednesday following the game in College Station.

“And some of it is him and he knows that. He owns it. But I promised him we would do a better job coaching him this week and preparing him.”

Freeze spent a lot of time with the offense in the days leading up to Saturday’s game against the top-ranked Bulldogs.

In the open portion of Tuesday’s practice, Freeze was seen working with Auburn’s wide receivers, who haven’t been strangers to criticism this season.

Meanwhile, after Thorne was sacked five times against the Aggies, Freeze added Wednesday that pocket presence was another point of emphasis in the week leading up to Saturday’s game.

Freeze was also more involved in in the play-calling against Georgia after he expressed being unhappy with offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery for abandoning RPO play calls – which had worked to that point – against the Aggies.

All of those were important steps in restoring Thorne’s confidence after he went 6-for-12 for just 44 yards against Texas A&M.

But all of those efforts would’ve been moot had the Auburn quarterback not fixed his own mindset first.

“We kind of ditched last week,” Thorne said Saturday night.

“We threw it in the garbage and learned what we needed to, but we weren’t hanging our heads over one game… So we put our heads back down and went back to work this week and tried to fix to the best we could the things that were tripping us up. I thought we made progress on that.”

Thorne finished his day 10-for-19 for 82 yards through the air against the Bulldogs – a mark that wasn’t much better than one he posted against the Aggies.

But unlike his errant misses against Texas A&M, Thorne’s misses against Georgia were narrow.

Of Thorne’s nine incompletions, six of them hit the hands of the intended receiver.

On the ground, Thorne led Auburn’s rushers for the second game this season as he tallied 92 rushing yards against Georgia – of which 61 yards came on a single trot down the Georgia sideline in the opening half.

“I read the defensive end, he crashed, kind of lost view of me so I pulled it and our two tight ends did a great job of blocking the two guys out there,” Thorne said of his 61-yard rush. “I tried to take off. Unfortunately, I wasn’t fast enough to get all the way to the end zone. You know, those DBs are really fast.”

A score there would’ve been great – especially considering the Tigers were forced to settle for a field goal to take a three-point opening lead instead of a seven-point opening league.

But the Tigers failing to eclipse the goal line wasn’t an end-all, be-all situation – especially in the first quarter.

Instead, Thorne’s sprint to the Georgia 30-yard line forced the Bulldogs to respect him and Auburn’s run game – something Georgia head coach Kirby Smart knew his team would have to do coming into the afternoon.

“In the past, we haven’t struggled with that kind of run game,” Smart said. “They hurt us. They caught us with some things they did and we expected it. That’s what’s disappointing. You expect it and you don’t stop it.”

The coach of the No. 1 team in the country admitted that his team knew to be on the lookout for Thorne and Auburn’s quarterbacks to call their own number. He also admitted that it was frustrating to watch his team neglect to stop the quarterback run anyways.

Talk about a confidence boost.

But we wouldn’t be telling the whole story if we didn’t say that Thorne and Auburn’s passing attack didn’t still leave plenty to be desired.

Auburn tallied just 88 passing yards against Georgia on Saturday, meaning the Tigers have passed for less than 100 yards in each of their three games against Power 5 opponents this season.

The good news is Auburn is 2-1 in those games. But that will surely catch up to the Tigers as the season progresses, hence Freeze harping on the importance of being balanced offensively.

“Offensively, I think we’re going to have to run the football in a lot of different ways and make it look different. We did some of that today,” Freeze said Saturday. “Then, be able to complete the passes that we need to complete when they are open. We had some of those again today. But our identity has got to stay balanced on offense.”

Becoming more balanced doesn’t happen overnight. Especially to a team that’s been plagued with inconsistencies at the most important position on the field.

“It’s a work in progress. Trying our best to mesh and figure everything out. But it’s still new to everybody,” Thorne said. “We’re still trying to figure out how to work everything best and what we’re doing exactly. But I think we made progress this week.”

Often times there’s pain in progress.

And that was certainly the case Saturday night as the loss to Georgia left Auburn’s locker room deflated by the would’ve, could’ve and should’ves of what could’ve been.

But there was progress – both for Payton Thorne and the Auburn offense.

The hope now is that the progress gets carried into the bye week as the Tigers prepared to visit the LSU Tigers on the road — a place Thorne has yet to prove he can compete at a high level.

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al.com

 

After Auburn’s near upset against Georgia, what is the playcalling plan?

Updated: Oct. 01, 2023, 12:21 p.m.|Published: Oct. 01, 2023, 11:34 a.m.

5–6 minutes

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Auburn football head coach Hugh Freeze on the sideline during the second half of an NCAA football game against Georgia on Saturday, Sept. 30, 2023, in Auburn, Ala. (AP Photo/Stew Milne)AP

This is exactly what Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze said he didn’t want to happen.

Back in July, when all he had to wear was a sports coat and stand in front of a microphone at SEC Media Days in Nashville, Tennessee, Freeze told a group of local media members that he hired offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery to call the plays.

He gave the same talking point in his session with local reporters as well as his podium address in the conference’s main hall: He said he used to think he was an elite play caller but doesn’t feel that way anymore.

“I have to look at myself with that,” Freeze said in July. “While I still believe in our system, I think there’s so many dynamics going on in the college game right now to rebuild Auburn, that it was very, very beneficial to get someone who has done it at a high level and has the capacity to do that. The game plan is formed by a lot of people. And I will be involved in that.”

At that point, Freeze said he still reserved the right to jump in to call plays when he felt he had the hot hand. But he wanted to focus on being a CEO, of sorts, and handling all the steps it was going to take to rebuild Auburn.

Five games into the season, that hasn’t quite worked out. That meant in Auburn’s biggest game of the season to date — a 27-20 loss to No. 1 Georgia — Freeze had significantly more authority in calling plays.

“I was really active in the plan,” Freeze said after the loss. “I approved every call that was on the call sheet.”

Freeze was very active on the sideline with his play call sheet and shouting out signals to the offense — far more so than any of Auburn’s previous games.

In offensive struggles against Cal and Texas A&M, Freeze never jumped in like he seemed to imply back in July. After barely beating Cal, Freeze said he only called a handful of plays, but those did include the game-winning touchdown pass on a fade route to tight end Rivaldo Fairweather.

Against Texas A&M, Freeze said Auburn didn’t run any of the run-pass-option plays that are central to his own offensive scheme. In turn, Auburn had its worst offensive performance of the year a week ago in College Station, Texas.

That caused, or maybe forced, Freeze to be more involved this week. It meant sacrificing time to recruit on maybe Auburn’s biggest recruiting weekend of the season — time he was hoping back in July that he’d have now because he hired Montgomery to call plays.

Freeze either called or served as a rubber stamp on every offensive play call based on his statement at the postgame press conference.

And Auburn may have had — at least considering the circumstances — its best offensive performance of the season under that shift in responsibilities.

Auburn put up 307 yards against the best team in the nation after barely cracking 200 yards against Texas A&M. That total included 219 rushing yards and averaging 5.1 yards per carry.

Freeze’s offense realized it had enough speed to beat Georgia running the ball to the perimeter so it got the ball out there as much as it could. Whether it was runs by the quarterbacks or running backs, Auburn had Georgia on the ropes because of its running game.

Quarterback Payton Thorne led Auburn with 92 rushing yards. Running back Jarquez Hunter had 59 and Brian Battie had 35. Quarterback Robby Ashford added 33 more.

Under Freeze’s expanded role, Auburn still was not able to establish a passing game. Throne and Ashford combined to throw for fewer than 100 yards. Thorne had 82 passing yards.

Freeze has often been known as a top quarterback developer, but through five games, he has not found that success so far. It’s a combination of factors that have led to those difficulties, with play calling likely among them.

For Auburn to find more success on offense in this new setup — relatively speaking, at least — it does beg some questions about Montgomery’s role going forward.

Battie said it is still Auburn’s offensive coordinator with a leadership role in practice.

“Coach Montgomery has still been running practices and calling plays,” Battie said. “I mean, Coach Freeze is always there in practice since fall camp. He’ll call his own plays every now and then but Coach (Montgomery), he’s still running the show.”

The bye week comes at a good time for Auburn. It’s got a lot on offense to sort out.

Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at mcohen@al.com

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al.com

 

Auburn plays ‘better than yesterday’; improves across the board in narrow loss to No. 1 Georgia

Published: Oct. 01, 2023, 8:00 a.m.

6–8 minutes

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Auburn linebacker Eugene Asante wore a baby blue-colored silicone bracelet on his right wrist during Saturday’s game against the top-ranked Georgia Bulldogs.

Written on it in red lettering were the words, “Be better than yesterday.”

Asante says the bracelet was given to him with the story that it honored a 19-year-old young man who died in a car accident. After the teen’s death, his family found a note of his that talked about “being better than yesterday.”

The message was a simple one that Asante knew he could apply to being a better human being, Christian and man, he said Saturday.

But it wasn’t by happenstance that Asante wore the wristband in Saturday’s game against the No. 1-ranked Georgia Bulldogs.

The Saturday prior the meeting with the top dogs, Auburn fell on the road to Texas A&M in what was the Tigers’ second sloppy performance away from The Plains. Auburn looked all but sharp in its first road game of the year at Cal in Week 2.

Nonetheless, Asante and the rest of the Auburn football team knew they didn’t play to their standard in College Station.

While Asante’s bracelet told him to “Be better than yesterday”, he also used the message to push himself and the rest of the Tigers’ roster to be better than last week.

And anyone who watched both games can testify that Auburn was, in fact, better than last week as it kept the No. 1 team in the country on the ropes for four full quarters, falling to Georgia 27-20.

“I think we came out and executed a little bit more and just put our best foot forward,” Asante said.

The Auburn offense — which didn’t score a touchdown in last week’s 27-10 loss to Texas A&M — looked vastly different in front of its home crowd Saturday.

All week, Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze said he intended to be much more involved in the offense when Georgia came to town after expressing his frustration with Philip Montgomery’s play calling from the week prior.

Before the game at Texas A&M, Auburn saw success with its RPO approach – only for it to be abandoned in College Station.

“If we don’t see more RPO plays, I’m going to have a heart attack,” Freeze joked Thursday on his weekly Tiger Talk radio appearance.

Needless to say, the RPO play calls returned against the Bulldogs on Saturday and helped the Tigers’ offense generate a balanced attack.

Auburn outgained Georgia 173 yards to 145 yards in the first half and took a 10-10 tie into the locker room. And all 10 of those points were score by the Tigers’ offense after it only mustered three points against the Aggies the week before.

“I was really active in the plan,” Freeze said after Saturday’s loss. “I approved every call that was on the call sheet.”

The Tigers’ passing attack was still far from brilliant against the Bulldogs. But that was probably a mix of Freeze wanting to play to Auburn’s strengths while also respecting what the Georgia defense was giving him and the Tigers to work with.

That said, Auburn’s offensive line appeared more cohesive in its effort on Saturday.

After giving up 15 negative plays and five sacks to the Aggies, the Tigers allowed the Bulldogs to tally just eight tackles for a loss and no sacks.

“I think we knew all along, we knew that Texas A&M game wasn’t our standard,” Auburn offensive lineman Kam Stutts said. “Came into practice this week and continued to just try to get better. Push ourselves. I think we showed a little bit more of what we’re capable of.”

With the help of the offensive line, Auburn’s rush attack also put together an encouraging outing against Georgia.

While quarterback Payton Thorne led all rushers with 92 yards, 61 of those came on one carry in the first half.

Junior running back Jarquez Hunter toted the ball the most on Saturday, tallying 59 yards on 19 carries and a touchdown. Meanwhile, USF transfer Brian Battie added 35 yards on eight carries and backup quarterback Robby Ashford rushed for 33 yards on four carries and a touchdown.

Auburn averaged 5.1 yards per carry against Georgia – a mark better than last week’s 3.5 yards per carry.

Defensively, the Tigers were able to continue to create turnovers on Saturday.

Against Texas A&M last week, Auburn scored its only touchdown as Asante returned a fumble recovery for a touchdown.

On Saturday, the Tigers tallied two turnovers – one fumble recovery and one interception. And though the defense didn’t take it upon itself to punch in a score, the Auburn offense had enough rhythm to make good on its end of the bargain and score off of both turnovers.

“We needed some of that to win this game,” Freeze said. “We preach when a break comes our way, score. I think we scored points on both of those. Those were huge.”

Perhaps the biggest improvement from the Tigers came somewhat silently.

After committing 10 penalties – some questionable and some on purpose – against Texas A&M, Auburn was called for just one penalty for five yards against Georgia.

And even better, they didn’t come in critical moments that pushed the Tigers out of field goal range or into 3rd- or 4th-and-long situations like they did last week.

“Coming off a road loss where we did not play particularly well, I felt they had a great week of practice, a great week of prep,” Freeze said. “Hopefully what’s revealed from that is they see that they can go toe to toe with some of the nation’s best.”

If Asante has permission to speak for the rest of Auburn’s roster, the Tigers know the potential they have after hanging around with the No. 1 team in the country.

“I think certainly it’ll give us a confidence boost,” Asante said. “We can be the team that we say we want to be, regardless of outside opinion, outside of the media… it does not matter. We can be who we think we are, we can be who we believe we are.”

And to keep doing that, he and the Tigers will have to keep referring back to that baby blue bracelet and work towards being better than yesterday.

The good news now is that Auburn has two weeks to do that as it draws a bye week before hitting the road to visit the LSU Tigers.

“We’ve just gotta continue to pick each other up and get ready for LSU over the bye week this week and ultimately put our best foot forward for LSU,” Asante said.

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[SaltyTiger 8,579]

Thanx Fiddy. Hope you are. Feeling better and happy bye week.

[Hank2020 3,358]

2 hours ago, SaltyTiger said:

Thanx Fiddy. Hope you are. Feeling better and happy bye week.

The bye week gives you time to rest up!! Oh, maybe not. Lol

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[bishoptf 754]

Didn't see this one, maybe it was from yesterday, not Goodman fan but I thought this was a really good article. Cam may have only played one year here but he bleeds orange and blue and supports us as much if not anyone else out there...major props and thanks for all that you have done for the university Cam, really was hoping you could win a Super Bowl, War Eagle!

 

https://www.al.com/auburnfootball/2023/10/goodman-is-cam-newton-what-we-want-college-football-to-become.html

 

Oh and thanks @aubiefiftyalways for rounding up the articles...:)

Edited October 2, 2023 by bishoptf

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