Auburn 31 Louisville 24. Wow, I usually use "the good the bad and the ugly" as my game review format but it really seemed applicable to the game this weekend. There were some very good moments on both sides of the ball for Auburn and then there were unfortunately some bad and ugly moments plus injuries as well. This one was definitely closer than I thought it would be especially after such a good start for the Tigers. I saw Auburn as the better team coming in and did not think this one would be close.
I definitely did not see such a bad performance by Jeremy Johnson coming. I did worry as I wrote in my season preview about him reading his press clippings but still did not see him playing that bad. However it was a lot better for him to do it yesterday than down in Baton Rouge. I have read several recaps and instant analysis on the game and one thing I think they are all missing is that Todd Grantham is a good defensive coordinator. Bobby Petrino has stated more than once that they had spent the entire off-season focusing on Auburn and they were also able to get pressure on Johnson.
I think the continuing theme from everyone is that at least Auburn grabbed the win and hopefully a lot of the things that went wrong yesterday are correctable. In fact, the biggest issues from yesterday will not be coaching ones but injury ones. Auburn saw some of its best players go down and the condition of those players will be the biggest questions marks this week. But of course Malzahn and company will give the press vague answers bordering on outright lies and we will probably not know the true answers till Auburn tees it up against LSU in two weeks.
But for now back to the game yesterday...
THE GOOD
It was December 31st, the last day of 2007. Auburn was playing Clemson in the Chick-Fil-A Bowl. The Auburn defense led by Coach Will Muschamp and soon-to-be NFL defensive tackle Pat Sims held an explosive Clemson offense to 20 points after getting put in some bad spots. The Auburn defense were the obvious heroes that night but many Auburn fans were excited about Tommy Tuberville's new offensive coordinator hire, Tony Franklin, and gave the offense all the glory even though Franklin was just calling Al Borges' shotgun plays and Auburn only scored 20 points in regulation. Muschamp left Auburn shortly after that and defense at Auburn overall went with him.
Over eight years later Muschamp returned with Auburn in another Chick-Fil-A event at the Georgia Dome and for at least a quarter or two, the Tiger defense seemed to return with him. Auburn was getting after it led once again by another soon-to-be NFL lineman in Carl Lawson. The defense shut out the Cardinals for over two and half quarters and everything seemed to be going according to plan. Unfortunately Lawson got hurt and Louisville went to plan B and finally got something going against the Tigers.
Louisville ended up with 24 points and over 400 yards of offense led by true freshman quarterback Lamar Jackson who had over 200 yards of offense himself. His speed and quickness really seemed to hurt a tiring Auburn defense plus the kid threw some good passes as well. The end result looked a lot like the bad box scores of the last few years for Auburn on defense but the early spark and overall aggressiveness is definitely one of the good things about this game.
Outside of Lawson, I saw some good things from Auburn's young defensive tackles and the secondary looked really good at times as well. I still did not see a whole lot of plays from Auburn's linebacking corps outside of a few outstanding ones from Justin Garrett but hopefully they will be coming. It was nice to Garrett contribute on the field after being out with injuries for so long. It was also good to see a lot of Auburn's young guys get some playing time as well. Auburn will need production out of those guys before this season is over.
Also on the good side of the ledger on Saturday was kicker Daniel Carlson. He kicked all of his kickoffs for touchbacks and nailed a 56 yard field goal. Carlson could end up being one of Auburn's most valuable players by the end of this season.
THE BAD
Jeremy Johnson. After an avalanche of preseason buzz, Auburn's star quarterback played maybe his worst game ever. I think everyone agrees, it wasn't that he threw three interceptions, it was how bad the interceptions were. I mean those were three ugly picks. I am just not sure what Johnson was thinking. He has got to play smarter than that especially after getting the lead early. Everything was going Auburn's way after getting the interception on the first play of game and making a textbook drive down for the game's first touchdown.
The offense just bogged down after that for the rest of the half. Auburn would get a first down and then do something dumb. There were lots of drive-killing penalties mostly holds. Auburn ended up with 80 yards of penalties for the day and that is on the coaches, it has to be cleaned up. Also most of that is on the offense as I saw several defensive players pull up and not make the stupid penalty that was made so many times last year. I have some complaints about the officiating but not the calls made against Auburn, more on that later.
Luckily, even having his worst day, Johnson was still able to hit some critical passes including a big one to Ricardo Louis to give Auburn a 24-0 lead early in the third quarter. Louis also made a great run on Auburn's last touchdown. That was what I have been wanting from Louis since they started putting him on that jet sweep. So many times in the past couple of years he would get the ball and hesitate looking for a hole but on his game-winning touchdown run this weekend he never hesitated and looked he had been shot out of a cannon taking it around the end.
Louis was good but the hero of the day on offense was running back Peyton Barber. Barber got hurt on A-Day last year and never seemed to recover as Cameron Artis-Payne took the job. This year he put up another good fight but Roc Thomas got the start and Javon Robinson was inserted early as well. It looked like another disappointing opener for Barber till both Thomas and Robinson went down with injuries and with Johnson throwing interceptions the offense sat squarely on Barber's shoulders. He was ready and rushed for 115 yards on 24 carries for almost 5 yards a carry. He definitely put Auburn on his shoulders several times during that game.
The line did a good job blocking for him. However I did not see much out of Auburn's young tight ends and H-backs. I saw the H-backs a lot more but it looks like they have a long way to go to me. The final big question that was on every Auburn fan's mind is why we did not throw more to Duke Williams. I do not think any of Johnson's interceptions were to Williams. He had only a quiet 40 yards on three receptions although all of those were clutch plays. It did not seem Louisville was doubling him. The guy is so good and is so obviously Auburn's best wide receiver. The coaches have got to game plan better and get him a lot more targets.
THE UGLY
First on the list, again I do not have a problem with penalties called on Auburn. Most of them looked like clear holds to me. Those are big penalties too. A ten yard holding penalty is usually a drive-killer. The refs called five or six holding calls on Auburn. The problem is I do not think they called ONE holding call on Louisville. I saw numerous blatant holds from Louisville's wide receivers and like a friend of mine remarked there is no way that little quarterback did as much scrambling as he did without a few blatant holds. All of that and no holds called.
Nothing gets me more upset that this subject. Auburn lost a national championship because of this same thing and there is no way Louisville makes it that close this weekend with a few holding penalties called on them. For the record, yes Florida State thew the ball 35 times two years ago and was not called for holding one time even with an NFL first round draft pick pass rusher going for Auburn. Call the penalties but call it both ways.
Next and probably the ugliest side of this game was the injuries. Everyone agrees Carl Lawson is by far Auburn's best defensive player and he was pulled from the game with a hip flexor injury. I doubt he plays against Jacksonville State. Will he be ready to go for LSU? Will he continue to have injuries nag him the whole season? Auburn's season will be greatly impacted by these questions.
Safety and playmaker Tray Matthews went down with what looked like a shoulder separation to me. How long will he be out? I thought he played a very good game Saturday and would also be greatly missed. The coaches are saying Roc Thomas and Jovon Robinson are not seriously injured but again I do think we will know that for sure till we see if they play against Jacksonville State. It looks like super frosh Kerryon Johnson might get to see a lot of action against the Gamecocks this weekend. Auburn has a lot of good players but is so thin in spots that injures will continue to be the biggest issue each week.
THE FINAL WORD
Auburn did not play well but got a tough win in a big neutral site game against a Power Five opponent. That is a very good thing. Now again I did not and still do not think Louisville is a great team. I still think they end up middle of the pack in the ACC however again Grantham is a very good defensive coordinator and they did get to spend a lot of time concentrating on Auburn in the preseason. Hopefully Jeremy Johnson will not have another game like that and will get back on track.
Auburn's future SEC opponents looked pretty good this weekend. Texas A&M got a huge win blowing out Arizona State and Bama looked their usual big strong selves against Wisconsin. Everyone else in the conference also won except for poor Vandy who dropped their opener to Western Kentucky. I think the Derek Mason era is already over in Nashville. The big ones next week will be Oklahoma visiting Tennessee and LSU heading to Starkville after having their opener stormed out.
I think the key for Auburn this next weekend is of course not getting anybody hurt, getting all these young guys a lot of playing time and getting ready for a huge game in two weeks down in Baton Rouge. I think everyone already had the LSU game circled but it is looking bigger and bigger as it gets closer...
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