It was a great day for me in Auburn despite the loss to Mississippi State. I took this photo of the new scoreboard from the coliseum right before the kickoff. I must say that it was an amazing sight to see as the Auburn football team entered the field.
I had a great turkey burger from Cheeburger Cheeburger and I would like to compliment the waitress crew for providing some excellent customer service. Also, the Mississippi State fans are some of the best in the SEC. They were all gracious and complimentary as I moved around the stadium. The best comment of the night was "you know that you guys would have beaten us with a better offense".
Sean White made his debut as the Auburn QB and he played fairly well and completed 20 of 28 passes for 188 yards. Auburn elected to receive and seemed to move the ball down the field with ease; however, the interception inside the 10 yard line stopped Auburn's momentum. Auburn was inside the "red zone"4 times and could only come up with 9 points. Auburn did leave points on the field. Field goals are nice, but touchdowns are much better. Also, Sean White was sacked 4 times so improvement is needed with the offensive line protection. He is a pocket passer so I am sure that he is still adjusting to the "read option" offense. It did seem that the play calling was very vanilla and I just wish that Auburn had attempted some longer pass plays down the field because the wide receivers were open. It is obvious that Auburn is still trying to find their offensive identity. I do expect to see Jason Smith playing QB before this season. The Auburn running game did show some promise with Peyton Barber rushing for 137 yards on 27 attempts.
Dak Prescott of Mississippi State is a good passing QB and had no trouble finding open receivers. He finished the night with 270 passing yards. The Auburn defensive line could not put any pressure on Prescott so he had plenty of time to locate his receivers. Auburn did hold them to 56 yards rushing.
Auburn did make defensive adjustments in the second half and they did play well enough for Auburn to win this game; however, the offense could not get the ball into the end zone. It does seem that the changes on defense by Muschamp may help in the future. Notable defensive changes were Tre' Williams and Justin Garrett starting at linebacker and Countess being moved to the safety position.
We are now 4 games into this football season and Auburn still has a difficult road ahead. It now appears that this may be a rebuilding year for Auburn and hopefully Gus Malzahn can find a way to turn this season around.
War Eagle!
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