Game 6 Review: Disaster Averted

Auburn 30  Kentucky 27.  The Auburn Tiger football team and its coaching staff finally accomplished something positive this season Thursday night in Lexington by winning their first conference game of the year and possibly avoiding disaster.  That is definitely a big deal and it is on the road in the SEC but it is still kind of hard to get excited about this game as I still see a poor Auburn team just hoping to get bowl eligible.  I also see more and more what Auburn is going to be under Gus Malzahn for the long term and that is also hard to get excited about.  Here is the good, the bad and the ugly in my opinion from game six for Auburn…

THE GOOD

One coach at least used this bye week to get his troops ready for this game and that was offensive line coach J.B. Grimes.  The Auburn offensive line simply dominated the line of scrimmage for most of the game especially the first half.  While Sean White did make a nice move and pass in the fourth quarter he owes all the credit to the offensive line for most of the rest of his completions as he had all day and more to throw.  I mean it was incredible how much time he had to throw early on.  They also cleared the way for a decent game running the ball against a defense totally committed to stopping run.
 

Another good thing was the offensive coaches finally decided to throw a few balls down the field and actually get the best receiver some touches.  What an idea!  I wish they would have thought of that earlier this season.  It paid off against Kentucky as Ricardo Louis had a career day with 154 yards receiving.  They also finally used Marcus Davis, a good possession wide receiver with a nose for the ball.  All of these receivers have been criminally unused but at least that changed a little last night.  However no matter how good Auburn passes the ball early on you can always count on Malzahn to tighten up and that brings us to…
 

THE BAD

Auburn had some success throwing the ball but when things got tight Malzahn put his head right back in the sand.  Auburn did throw it 27 times which is good for Malzahn but ran it 47 times for only 152 yards.  That is only a three yard average and shows a defense completely sold out to stop the run.  In that case you keep throwing the ball but Malzahn simply does not seem to have the stomach for it.  He also seems incapable of calling a simple drop back pass. 
 

I know, I know, Auburn is a “run-based play-action” team and the play-action is an integral part of the Tiger's passing game.  However it should not be used on ALL passes!  Late in the game Gus and the boys called another slow developing double play-action play and Sean White like in the State game got buried.  On top of that, on Sean White’s best play of the game, the deep throw to Louis late in the game, there was a play-action called on an obvious passing down and without a nifty side-step and a bad play by the defense White would have been sacked on that play.  I do not know how many times I have said it now but sometimes you just need to call a simple straight pass play.
 

THE UGLY

I have read this morning about the Auburn defense getting the big “stop” to end the game.  I mean I guess that is somewhat accurate although they are lucky a Kentucky wide receiver dropped a deep ball he had in his hands on the previous play.  The defense is just bad or I guess I should say ugly.  They gave up almost 500 yards of offense in this game and could have easily given up over 30 points.  They gave up another huge run to open the game which gave the other team points and momentum. They also gave up over 350 yards passing to the opposing quarterback.  I will say there was pretty good coverage on some of those plays and the Kentucky quarterback made some great throws but there were many more bad plays by the defense. 

You can see some talent like defensive back Carlton Davis.  That guy is good and is going to get better.  However there is just not enough.  This defense just looks like it is going to get humiliated in most or all of Auburn’s upcoming games.  On top of that the future does not looks bright either.  Auburn will lose several seniors on defense and while they are obviously not irreplaceable it does not appear there are enough good players to replace them much less establish any depth.  It is the understatement of the year but Auburn needs more good defensive players badly.

THE LAST WORD
Well all the Sean White fans are crowing today as he did play a pretty good game.  Of course he still has yet to throw a touchdown and almost threw another critical red zone interception but he did play a good game.  White can be a decent quarterback, my problem with Sean White is I do not think he will ever be a whole lot better than what we saw against Kentucky.  I do not think he can beat Bama or Georgia.  Jeremy Johnson has the tools to be a game changer.  However Johnson might as well get his transfer papers ready because he is done at Auburn.  I cannot believe that this guy's career at Auburn is done after only three games. 

Finally I guess I am the dumb one for expecting much out of a Gus Malzahn team that is not completely loaded.  As a friend told me this week, a season only slightly better than this is the mean for Malzahn as an offensive coordinator and now as a head coach.  We now have the 2009, 2011 and 2013 seasons plus this one.  In all three of those seasons Auburn went 8-5, did not have a winning season in conference and lost to Georgia and Bama.  One season is a blip, two seasons start to show something and three seasons is a trend.  I guess the good news for this season is that trend says Auburn will win a few more games I do not expect them to and finish 7-5.  Several of Auburn's upcoming opponents are good but not juggernauts as Toledo and now Memphis proved so hopefully Auburn will get some lucky bounces to get closer to that standard Malzahn season.