Auburn’s defense wasn’t the reason it lost to Arkansas Saturday.
In fact, it’s what kept the Tigers in the game after the offense turned the ball over five times. But it was far from perfect, and many of its worst plays came in critical situations.
Take a third-and-19 in the third quarter for example, when Arkansas quarterback Taylen Green escaped the pocket and threw a 58-yard bomb to give the Razorbacks a lead they never lost. Or you can look at a roughing the passer on a third down in the first half that extended a drive leading to another Arkansas touchdown.
From a far, it’s easy to look at Auburn holding Arkansas under 350 total yards and feel good about the defense. But looking closer, and the unit is far from what it needs to be to keep bailing out the offense.
“It was devastating truthfully,” Hugh Freeze said after the game about the third and long plays. “I wanna say it was three to four third and longs that if we get off the field and we get the ball back, we got a chance to get a tie game.”
Most of the third down conversions came with Green either running for a first down or making a throw after escaping the pocket.
“Man, finishing tackles. That was the biggest thing. The guy’s got wheels,” defensive tackle Philip Blidi said of Green.
It’s the second straight week Auburn has struggled with a mobile quarterback, and after Oklahoma benched starter Jackson Arnold against Tennessee, Auburn could see another one next week with true freshman Michael Hawkins.
The other issue on third down was penalties, due in part to poor discipline and bad technique. The most frustrating one for Auburn was Austin Keys’ roughing the passer on a third-and-seven in the first quarter, a play where Green was throwing the ball out of bounds.
Arkansas finished the game with an astounding six third down conversions of 10 or more yards and was 6-for-9 on those third down opportunities.
The defense was good throughout most of the game, but like the offense, it couldn’t stay out of its own way. The bad third down defense might not be as detrimental if the offense was more consistent, but as things stand now, Auburn doesn’t have much room for error on defense.
Peter Rauterkus covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @peter_rauterkus or email him at [email protected]m
