GAME 7 REVIEW: AGAINST THE TREND

Auburn 38  Arkansas 23.  As I titled this post I thought Auburn really rose up against the trends that were telling everyone this was a loss.  I thought the Tigers coached and played their finest game of the season in this one.  Auburn had a shot against Penn State but it was like they were just hanging in there.  Bo Nix almost single-handedly led the win at LSU.  Arkansas was on a two game losing streak but they had beaten Texas and Texas A&M while almost taking down Ole Miss as well.  Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman has done some good coaching the last two seasons so not only did Arkansas have the home field advantage it looked like they had the coaching one as well.  Finally any longtime Auburn fan can tell you how things usually go with 11am kickoffs in Fayetteville.  The trends in this one had everyone in the country except the homers predicting Arkansas to win the game.  I know I did not feel good at kickoff.  

Last week I ended my post stating: "This game coming up comes down to the coaches in my opinion.  Who can get their teams ready to play and get the win?".  I then stated I thought it would be Pittman and I then asked Bryan Harsin to prove me wrong.  He did and that is the story this week.  Bryan Harsin and the staff at Auburn finally showed me something.  They helped get the players off the mat after a brutal beatdown by Georgia and they got them ready to play on the road with an 11am kickoff.  Again, just a cursory view of Auburn's history shows that is no small feat.  Auburn came to play on both sides of the ball and seemed to just want it more than the home team.  That is coaching and I am definitely glad to be proven wrong.  This was an absolutely huge win for Auburn going into a bye week before a big home game against the Ole Miss Rebels.  Auburn desperately needs the bye and it was so good  to get a win before it.

THE GOOD

There is a lot of this to go around this week.  The Auburn offense was very good most of the day.  The Tigers came out and drove down the field and put it in the end zone on a big play and great pass by Bo Nix to Ja'Varrius Johnson.  The forty yard bomb was absolutely huge as the Tiger offense has been missing the big play most of the season.  That is EXACTLY what the Auburn offense needed to do.  Auburn put up one more big touchdown drive in the second quarter and in the second half Nix connected with Demetris Robertson for a 71 yard touchdown pass.  The offense then followed that big play up with a drive for a field goal and one more big touchdown drive.  Nix finished 21 of 26 for almost 300 yards and those two big touchdowns.  He also spread the ball around to TEN different receivers.  The Auburn wide receivers after being dogged out all week caught nearly every ball that came their way this week.

You have to feel good for those guys after the beating they took all week from the fans and the media.  Now the offense definitely had a big swoon at the end of the second and beginning of the third quarter.  Bo Nix made his only big mistake of the day throwing an interception right before halftime and then the defense allowed the Razorbacks to drive down and score and get the momentum.  Arkansas took the opening drive of the second half and drove for a touchdown to take the lead.  The Razorbacks then forced Auburn into two 3-and-outs.  It looked like it was Arkansas' time however the defense then made a huge play getting a sack and fumble in the end zone to give Auburn back the lead and the momentum.  The Tigers never looked back.  Like the big pass plays on offense, this was the big forced turnover that the Auburn coaches have been expecting from this defense.  It was arguably the biggest play of the game.

THE BAD AND THE UGLY

First there was the report of a crazy Bama fan fatally shooting another Bama fan last Saturday after the Tide's loss to Texas A&M.  Next Vol fans pelted the field with various objects at the end of their loss to Ole Miss including a golf ball allegedly thrown at former Vol coach Lane Kiffin.  The SEC has adoped the moniker "that is just means more" but I mean come on people.  It is still just a game and you have just got to get a hold of yourself.  I was in the middle of the Bama mob after "Wrong way Bo" and the Van Tiffin kick in 1984 and 1985.  I had to get to my car after Bama stopped Frank Sanders one foot short in their home game in 1994.  I was there till the end in Jordan Hare on "Black Saturday" in 2001 when Bama won 31-7 and the Bama fans in attendance seriously rubbed it in.  I was there for that awful SEC Championship game against Georgia in 2017 with a bunch of a-hole Bulldog fans.  I know the rage "that turns good men cruel".

However before you do something stupid you just have to get control of yourself.  As we were getting heckled all the way out of the stadium in 94 I told my brother "just walk out with class".  That is all you can do.  I have also found a good way to handle it is to in the words of Patrick Swayze "just be nice" during those times.  I was with my wife at the 2000 SEC Championship game when Florida beat the stew out of Auburn.  Our tickets were in the SEC East section and we were getting ridden hard by some Florida frat boys.  They were screaming at us till I finally turned around and said "hey you guys are right you have a really good team and you are kicking our ass".  They almost immediately relented and were nice to us the rest of the game.  I am not saying it works every time but it can turn a volatile situation into at least a tolerable one.  

THE LAST WORD

You also have to remember that it is those tough times that make the big ones so sweet.  Bama won a national championship in 1992 and Auburn lost perhaps its greatest coach and was placed on NCAA probation.  The Tigers then won 20 games in a row over the next two years and it felt so good after going through that.  Auburn went to the mountain top in 2010 but then fell into the deepest valley by 2012.  In 2011 Auburn was blown out by every good team they played and as most everyone remembers in 2012 Auburn had literally the worst season EVER.  Meanwhile Bama won national championships in 2011 and 2012.  I literally had to almost walk away from college football it got so bad and made me so mad but then we got the beautiful 2013 season.  Sports can drive you crazy and drive people to do really stupid things and that is why you have to check yourself and remember things will get better, well unless you are a Vandy fan...

As I said earlier the 2021 Auburn Tigers football team now enters their bye week for the stretch run.  The Tigers have won the important games to keep them in the race for the SEC West.  It is obviously a long shot that I do not think will happen but it is a big deal.  The big road win did a lot to stabilize things but it is also wise to remember this team also barely avoided losing to Georgia State and in the end did not even really challenge the best team from Georgia.  Auburn also might be facing the two best teams on their schedule outside Georgia and Bama after this bye week.  Things can still go really good or really bad, this team must continue to improve.  That is head coach Bryan Harsin's current challenge.  I was mad last week and impressed this week, I honestly do not have a real gut feeling on how this is going to turn out.  My best case scenario for what I think might happen is this team going 3-1 in their next four games losing to either Ole Miss or Texas A&M and beating the other plus State and South Carolina.  It starts now using these next two weeks to prepare and build on a good first half to this season.