I know it feels like Auburn beat Baylor a week ago at this point, but Labor Day and all…
When you spend an offseason talking about Auburn’s wide receiving corps and if Jackson Arnold will be able to get them the ball as if a former 5-star recruit has a noodle of an arm, what do you do? You barely throw the ball and let Jackson Arnold show that he can run through, around, and over a defense even if he had no arms.
Of course, some or most of that could be due to Baylor playing for the pass for almost the entirety of the game (thank you, media narratives), but still. That boy fast.
As it all really comes down to, the Auburn offensive line looked a line of old. The holes were maximal. The sacks and stuffed runs were minimal. The running game was there all night. Four rushing touchdowns, two by your quarterback? Yeah, that”ll do. That’s what Auburn is built on.
Does that mean the passing game was completely inept? No. Going 11 of 17 to 7 different receivers for 108 yards isn’t groundbreaking, but it was a small complement to what the Baylor defense kept allowing over… and over… and over again. It’s already been said, but there was just no real reason to throw it, especially when you average more yards per play on the ground than through the air.
Now for the defense…
You’re going to give up a lot of yards to a Big 12 passing team like Baylor. Truthfully, Auburn won’t see a P4 team that passes like that rest of the season. But the tackling… yeah. Something has to change there.
Sure, the multiple 4th down touchdowns, the 3rd-and-very long conversions, and the crossing pattern to the same guy, their only guy, over and over were mind-numbing, but seeing SEC tacklers let a Big 12 guy slip off their fingers like he was covered in bacon grease? That was the only true bad thing I can take a way from this one.
But that will be fixed. I hope.
All in all, Auburn went on the road to play a P4 opponent – that some are picking to win their conference – in a stadium full of Baptists hellbent on knocking off a team from the conference they love to hate. They were doing so with a new quarterback with questions all over the place and left with a 14-point win. Without those 4th down scores it would’ve been a true blowout.
There are things to fix, and teams now know about Jackson Arnold’s legs, but Auburn has two weeks against two lesser teams to show he has an arm and to make sure tackling fundamentals are shored up.
But that’s for the next two weeks. Let’s relish the fact that Auburn is 1-0 with a good road win. Some teams can’t say that.
