Coach Hugh Freeze sat down with the media ahead of the Auburn-Georgia game. This is what he said.
Opening remarks…
“It’s exciting to be in what I refer to as ‘season two,’ after the first bye week. Obviously wish we’d have gone into it in a little different circumstances, but I love the fact that there’s so much still in front of us. We can’t wait to be back in Jordan-Hare. Seventeenth straight sellout, which I think is a new record. We get to play a night game in a rivalry like this that dates back for years. Super exciting to our staff and to our kids and our fans, and I know it will be an incredible environment for us to go test ourselves against another top quality opponent. It will be fun to be at home for sure. We haven’t handled the road as well as you would hope. But hopefully a home environment changes some things, the way we play.
“Before we move on to Georgia, you expect more … you work your whole life to get to a place like Auburn. There’s 16 staffs that get an opportunity to coach in this league. When you don’t perform in a manner that gives your kids a chance to win a game like a couple of weeks ago against a really good football team, it’s sickening and it’s disappointing. I just assure you that we’ve worked tirelessly in the open week to correct and give our kids the best chance to win. The accountability rests upon me and our staff, and obviously there’s things the kids have got to be accountable for, too. But by and large, it’s disappointing that we didn’t give our kids a better chance to win that football game. The great thing is it’s behind us, and there’s so much sitting in front of us. It starts with this week, playing at home against Georgia. I told our team yesterday how excited I am, and I know our staff is. And they’ll be the same. Great test, and looking forward to it.”
On what he learned coming out of the bye week…
“The first thing, again, I’d say is that I’d love to put this behind us and move on to Georgia. It starts with me and my staff being adequately prepared to not be behind the chains the whole night. We’ve done a really good job of taking care of the football, but now you look at the last two games and we certainly have put ourselves behind the chains way too much with some undisciplined penalties and questionable play calling that puts us behind the chains. We obviously either didn’t coach well enough to execute or just not good schematical plays.
“So we’ve studied it all. We got to find a way to stay ahead of the chains and, again, playing at home does make what we want to do a little bit easier, but you’re playing against defenses like (Texas) A&M, Georgia and Oklahoma, you still have to execute really well and have a game plan. There wasn’t much time off during the open week for the staff or the kids truthfully, and looking for ways to make sure we improve that.”
On Jackson Arnold being risk-averse…
“We’ve talked about that because he’s done an incredible job of taking care of the football. Truthfully, when we watch the film together, I’d love for him to be a little freer, particularly with the playmakers that we have. And there’s times, I think, he probably would be if we could hold up just maybe another half a second or a second. But yeah, you want to take care of the football first and foremost, and him doing that as poorly as we’ve played still kept us in a game and gave us a chance to win so there’s a lot of positives from that, but certainly don’t want him to play out of any fear. Hopefully after our meetings throughout last week and through the game planning this week, maybe he’ll be a little more freer to give our kids a chance.”
On if Arnold plays freer in practice…
“A mixture, to be candid. If you’re talking skelly, free as can be, if you’re talking the other, it pretty much a bunch mirrors the game when it’s good on good. First progression and second progression are pretty good, then he becomes a little hesitant. But we’re working through that, believing him strongly still. I’ve got to do a better job, along with Kent (Austin) and Jesse (Stone), of coaching him to be freer and when our guys are in some one-on-ones, give them a chance with catchable balls.”
On the offensive line and potential changes…
“(Izavion Miller) will probably get some more rotation, for sure, but protection-wise, you can’t get in third-and-long constantly. I know you watch other games, and it’s just not going to work out. The first thing we have to do is not create penalties that put us in those positions, that allow us to get the ball out quicker with the quick game and things where we don’t have to constantly throw the ball down the field or depend on a draw or something to try to create an explosive play in those situations where you don’t want to, again, put your defense in another disadvantage situation. So again, the pass protection, can we strain more? Sure. We’re not going to win those one-on-ones all of the time in those situations when they know what you have to do, nor are a lot of other teams. The teams that are successful on third downs are the teams that are winning first down and staying ahead of the chains. Yes, we can work on technique. Yes, we can work on our backs protecting better and using our tight ends, but the bottom line, let’s don’t get in those situations too much where they don’t have to be where the defense has their ears pinned back, constantly coming after us.”
On how they handled the bye week, and the sense of urgency in the building…
“A mixture. We definitely self-scouted everything to see where we’re heavy tendency wise on things. We had plenty of time, so it was both. We got a jump start on Georgia also. Sense of urgency, look – there’s always a sense of urgency. We play in the SEC. There’s a lot of teams that are in situations similar to ours, and now it’s about the next game up, and that’s Georgia for us. What an exciting opportunity, and that’s what our focus is. The sense of urgency should be heightened constantly when you get these opportunities.”
On Georgia’s defense…
“I think their ability to adjust. I think if you look at how they go about adjusting, they are still very talented. I mean, those linebackers are as good as you’re going to see. The secondary is very talented. They’re big up front. Maybe not as twitchy as some that you’ve seen. But boy, they play their technique extremely well. They’re deep. They adjust and they know exactly … I have played Kirby a long time, and you hurt them with a play, you can be assured that they’ll have an answer for the next time. And they’ll have some kind of twist, obviously, that we haven’t seen that will be prepared for us, but they’ve certainly put themselves in the position to win most of their games. Even the Tennessee game, where they gave up a lot of points. That happens sometimes when teams get momentum, but their guys found a way to get stops when they had to to get the win. They are resilient also.”
On a sense of urgency for Saturday’s game…
“In our team meeting when we got back yesterday – they got Friday and Saturday without practice – we talked about season two, because that’s where we are. I break the season down into those bye weeks, season one, season two and season three. Everything is still in front of us, and it starts with an incredible rivalry game that you ought to just relish the opportunity to play in. To get to do it at home, which I think we’ve won four straight at home now, and hopefully that gives us an advantage. I know our people will be a factor in this game, and that will be nice as we have not experienced that the last couple of weeks. It’s definitely a mixture. Yes, there’s always a sense of urgency because it’s the next SEC game, but you can’t run from the fact that this rivalry game means something to a lot of people.”
On injury updates…
“I was told six to eight weeks on (Horatio Fields), so I guess we’re on week two now. I never know exactly what that means. You’ve got that time frame and then the time frame after that for him to actually get back going and feel good enough to cut and play at receiver. If you’re an offensive lineman, it might be a little quicker, but when you’re running and have to make cuts, you’re never quite sure exactly what that timeline looks like. Other than him, feeling good at this point that everybody else is available.”
On how valuable a self-scout is during the bye week…
“Again, I didn’t like the feeling of going into an open week playing like we did offensively, but it was much needed for me to really get in a room, sometimes by myself, sometimes with (Derrick) Nix and the other staff. Traditionally throughout the years we’ve been able to find a way to move the football. Again like I said in my opening statement, it’s just something that doesn’t sit well with any of us in that room, and we know that we have good enough players to have a much better performance and you have to take it personally. So, it was not a good feeling, but a good time for us to evaluate all that.”
On the recruiting opportunity this weekend…
“These are the types of environments you want to get your top guys to, for sure, and even other’s top guys. To see the special atmosphere that we have at Auburn, and our special fans and student section, and everybody that is so supportive. I think we have an environment here that is very attractive. As I said earlier, nobody wants to hear, nor do I, that we are closer, but we have to get over the hump in some of these games and prove that we just need a little more help to help us get over the hump against all of these top-10 teams that we have in a row, or top 15, whatever they are. I can’t keep up with that. I think we have proven that we are right in the mix with them. Convincing these recruits in a game like this, come help us get over the hump, is vital.”
On the running game and the offensive line’s run blocking ability…
“I don’t know that you’re ever totally satisfied, but again some of the credit goes to the defenses. I mean, if you look at the last two we’ve played, they are doing pretty good against the other folks, and it’s not the easiest task to block great defenses consistently all along, but I think if you look at our average per carry you would have to say that it’s not that bad, and we probably need to commit to it more. There are some things we certainly can improve upon, but again I go back to our first seven out of eight possessions last week we got behind the chains with penalties of some type, whether it’s a false start or a holding. Every time we seem to have something going we got in one of those situations, and it makes it even harder to evaluate exactly how consistent we are when we get in a game like that. It was such a weird deal where you really weren’t committed to that consistently because of the down and distances.”
On feeling pressure facing a third straight top-15 opponent…
“I can only talk about what the staff and I (feel), and I don’t sense it from the players. You know, it’s the next game up, and you look around, everything is still right in front of you. You’ve got to forget the last one and move on to the next one, and that’s what we’re doing. You get up the next morning, and you go to work, and you improve. I know that this team is closer than we’ve ever been in the two-and-a-half years that I’ve been here or so. I’m ready to get us over the hump. I don’t worry about the pressure or any of that. I know that we are doing things the right way with our kids, with our team and I know our young kids are going to be really, really good and they’re really, really talented, and they deserve to have the chance to win those games that we’ve been in the last few weeks, and we as a staff have to do everything with our power to afford them that opportunity. They’re playing hard with great passion and energy. I don’t see any of that wavering. I don’t worry about noise. I think that’s probably the biggest thing you worry about with your players is just noise that truthfully has very little significance on whether or not we’ll win a game, other than the mental battle that that plays on young men sometimes, because unfortunately, too many spend too much time probably getting their identity from that. We fight hard to make sure they know that is not the proper place to get their identity from, and that you stay in the fight together until the bitter end, and I think good things will start happening for this team.”
On Xavier Chaplin…
“We’ve done some testing on his hearing, and there’s an issue there. That goes back to us, we should’ve handled the cadence stuff differently for him, but he really struggles to hear in those environments, and we’ll make adjustments for that. When he’s on time off the ball, he’s pretty dang good. Nobody hurts more than him. He was really distraught. I wish that we would’ve put him in a better position.”
