Postgame Pod: Reaction to Auburn's 73-3 win over Alabama A&M

welcome on in everybody here at Auburn undercover.com here with Jason caldwells they just turned on the water on us here at Stadium the Cannons are out but thankfully nobody's here trying to trying to get us off the field uh Jason a pseudo scrimmage that I think we sort of saw today some really good execution from this team in their season opener against Alabama A&M 73 to3 that's that's about as convincing as you can get as H fre touched on the postgame lots of stuff to work on but in particular we talked about these new receivers they were clicking on all cylinders in this first game doesn't matter who you were playing that was an impressive element of Auburn season opener today yeah it was I thought they did exactly what they needed to do um you know when you start talking about executing and offense defense special teams uh making plays getting guys in space I thought one of the the biggest parts of the game is something I've been screaming about for years which is they kept they kept playing offense yeah they didn't just go hey let's middle of the second quarter it's 38 to nothing let's just go in a shell and run the ball up the middle they didn't do those things and that's that's valuable for Malcolm Simmons and Perry Thompson and those guys uh it's valuable for for Hank Brown um they got to actually some some real world experience in this offense but I thought that was big and so I like those things we thought we'd see a bunch of guys on defense we did um you know some some mistakes here there but overall it's hard to ask for a whole lot more than we saw tonight right right and as as Jason brought up I mean those two shot plays in the second half as freze mentioned one of them is off sides so that's the throw of Sam Jackson as you pointed out that was that's kind of a circus play it's definitely one of those interesting on I he kind of stole it from Bryce K there at the last at the last minute but jumps off sides you got to throw it there and then like you mentioned you know them continuing to run the offense the The Long play to Malcolm Simmons is an RPO had an extra guy in the Box Simmons is one-on-one hits a nice little start stop um three touchdowns for the Freshman uh Perry Thompson gets one cam Coleman on his first ever College catch gets a touchdown and Malcolm Simmons gets two touchdowns because as you mentioned special teams was also in a good spot we saw Keon Scott get a punt return touchdown stepped out barely Ste barely stepped out um but Michael riy blocks a punt and town meoo towns m is great impressive as we thought he would be he was booming the ball like crazy and kicked a couple that were inches away from going into the stands now he was a little downwind but um yeah I mean it was it was a a fun game exactly what you want yeah and pton Thorne this was an opportunity for him to show off some of his new toys um because every touchdown that was thrown by any quarterback today was to a new player it was to somebody who wasn't here last year Keandre Lambert Smith is uh is also somebody that should be mentioned he had two touchdowns today he had him and cam Coleman back toback just oneplay drives just throwing it down the field um really nicely done rub route with Cam Coleman kind of occupying two guys not really touching them um Keandre Lambert Smith gives you that sort of presence and then we see Sam Jackson the Cal transfer he gets in on the fun there um but for pton Thorne I thought it was obviously like like free said there were a coup throws he he may have wanted back um when you go for 300 plus and four touchdowns it's it's tough to complain about that much but they know that you're going to really want those throws back against somebody like Cal you're really going to want those throws back against somebody like Arkansas but at the end of the day you look at the stat line and what he was able to do with these receivers this was a little taste I think of the explosion that this group could have that they've been searching for for years and obviously it's why they went so hard in the 24 class for these guys yeah I think it's something we've learned from Hugh freeze I think it's something that is part of their Style is that they they want Perfection and even in a game like tonight you go look there's going to be some things that you didn't do well and he talked about you know Payton Thorn there were some decisions a couple of things a couple of protections um that's what you do you you pick apart go hey there's things that can get better because you're right you're not always going to have you know wide open TouchDown throws um but I did think and it it showed up tonight no matter who you're playing you can you can see I've seen Auburn teams for a long time Albama A&M's not terrible there's been Auburn has played worse teams than that but you see when you have talented guys and you execute and you have a system and you have a plan that you can go out and put up some big things and we saw that tonight like hey look those they weren't just going oh we're just going to go run this play no they were going look let's go execute what exactly we're supposed to do and they continue to put put up points yeah and I just thought like you said sort of noticing those little things the confidence of Thorne like glancing down field knowing like all right it's a one-on-one he's probably going to be behind the defense I'm just going to put the ball back there that's obviously why you go out and try to get such good receiving Talent defensive side of the ball 10 tackles for loss in this game I thought that was a big point we saw guys like Malik blockton get into backfield Jaylen mlau got into backfield Demarcus rck uh had some big plays Robert Woodard had a really really good game and so uh we knew we were going to see those guys flying around on defense uh Freeze's one criticism I think you know that he touched on a couple times for the defense is he thought they would kind of crush the pocket a little bit better um it was interesting too he said you know the game planning both offense and defense sort of went a different way than you expected that's that's what week one is because you have no film you have no idea um so it'll be interesting to kind of see what they do to change things up for Cal Isaiah Rees didn't go sort of a minor ankle thing they held him out with but uh by all accounts I mean a very disruptive defensive front for them and I thought a couple goal line stands now they missed the field goal of course at the end of those but for them to Bow up doesn't matter who you're playing um I thought it was some good execution on that end yeah no I you're I I think the that's the one question for me still is is the middle of that defensive line we saw Kell faul and we jayen McLoud Kon Crawford really athletic outside we saw a lot of jamont Waller Malik alry I mean Malik blockon made plays and you go but did we see any from any of the other guys were was there a lot of guys that made and created havoc in the middle of that defensive front right no can Isaiah Rees be that guy I think that's still the question mark that's probably the biggest question coming out of here you know we saw secondary wise made a a couple of mistakes here there you expect those things from a group of guys that were really playing for the first time but overall it's hard to critique a whole lot yeah I'm trying to think about what elements really haven't been mentioned I mean they scored in 47 seconds uh jar time possession terrible time possession yeah they definitely lost the time of possession battle uh jarest hunter gets the first touchdown of the season if you stood in the concession line got caught up in one for a little bit too long you may have legitimately come back to your seat and it been 21 nothing I they scored in 66 seconds worth of um of time of possession and so but like Q free said it was just the fact that they were running the offense it was not he you know we talked about the pass run you know ratio tonight it was not an example of H you know we feel good about beating this team up let's just run the ball and get out of here now for the first time in my time covering the team they changed the second half 10-minute quarters I have never personally been a part of that but like you said it was so important for them to go out there and run the offense because it you know opened up those explosive plays and like we talked about before the game that's just the kind of stuff you want on tape now going into a much tougher opponent yeah you know I thought I thought going to 10 minutes quarters was the right thing to do because you had 10 extra minutes you're probably going to get some snaps for guys but free said the balance is you know trying not to embarrass someone while still sooner or later you're going to have to get there and go boys we just got to run up the middle we we just got to get out of here then you're just kind of wasting your time so I thought they handled it well thought it did you know good job and again um crowd was great students were awesome um you know this was um everything you could hope for for a season opener for 18 te that it's going to pend on so many young guys sure really good environment uh Keandre Lambert Smith talking to him in the locker room he was saying you know last time they were here it was an orange out as well certainly a different environment for him coming from Penn State but obviously they they did a really good job I thought um with a good night game here against an obviously an overmatch opponent everybody sort of stayed in it the whole way and so um good opener good opener all around we are really looking forward now it's it's a quick page turn now to a good team in Cal a team that has a lot more competency on both sides of the ball is obviously a lot more talented and is a team that took you to the wire last year so we'll obviously get into previewing them um throughout the week but uh for Jason Caldwell I Nathan King hope everybody enjoyed the season opener for Auburn 73 to 73 to3 over Alabama A&M be sure to check us out Auburn undercover.com