THE GOOD 1. The safety. It turned out to be the difference in the game 2. Montgomery. He had an All-American night with the safety and 3.5 tackles behind the line. 3. The defense in general. Second-half shutout. Only gave up a TD when a fumble gave the opponent a short field. 4. A road win in the SEC in a hostile stadium. We needed to punch that ticket. It was ugly, but so was the State game last season. 5. It was our trap game and we got past it. Auburn was really fired up because their fans were down on them, the locker room material from Copeland, and they lost a student coach before the game. 6. Spencer Ware is back. THE BAD 1. The offense. Inconsistency showed it's ugly head last night. One touchdown. 6 of 18 third down conversions. 2. Mettenberger's fumbles. It almost cost us the game. 3. The left tackle. Dworaczyk must get healthy and quicker or someone else must step up. I don't know who. 4. Play calling. Auburn stacked the line and we did not force them out of it with sideline plays and passes downfield. 5. Referees. This was one of the best ref teams in the SEC but they missed a lot of late hits and don't seem to call holding anymore. 6. It seemed like we didn't see enough of Hilliard. Is he hurt? THE UGLY 1. 80 Yards of penalties. I said after game one that penalties will cost us a game this year if we don't get it under control. It is not under control. The personal fouls are senseless. 2. The 20-yard punt from Wing. I trust we will not see much more of that. Everybody shanks one now and then.
Normally I have a little different take than you red but not this time. That's spot on. We gotta get our O Line under control. Whatever the cost. Miles better burn redshirts and do whatever it takes to get more pass protection. We have one of the biggest OLines in the country, this should not be happening.
I would like to add... Good...Spencer Ware, welcome back my friend, does anyone run more violently than Ware in the country? If so I haven't seen them. Russell Shepard, saved a touchdown on special teams kick off. While he couldn't come down with the long pass in the endzone, that would have been a tough catch, and I'm thoroughly impressed with the heart and character 10 has, especially since his career hasn't panned out the way everyone expected. Eric Reid, he also saved a touchdown by making a jersey tackle, he is over aggressive a lot, but that play was huge. Freak Johnson, this guy needs to play more, he had 2 drive killing sacks, or tackles behind the line can't remember who he tackled. The bad....Kicking game, Wing wasn't his usual self and Alleman missed a short field goal, unacceptable. The Ugly... Red covered that already. I would also like to see Les jump all over the Oline like he did Jalen Mills and Lavar Edwards. Lavar's didn't even look like a penalty to me, what you can't block the qb on a turnover?
The only thing I don't agree with is putting the kicking team in as the "bad". Wing had some REALLY good punts that helped us out a lot. He only had one that came off the side of his foot when he was trying to pin Auburn deep. Alleman's missed FG was 43 yards and it was rushed, hardly a chipshot. I actually think that was the worst play call of the night. Why hold the ST on the sideline and the rush them on for the kick instead of letting them set up like normal? You had an entire 40 second play clock.
The only thing I'd say about Ware is that he has a tendency to run a little high and not lower his head. I loved when Eric Reid grabbed that lil dude's jersey and flung him down like a rag doll.
Um. . .were we watching the same game? Is this the same Spencer Ware who knocked a kid out last night by lowering his head? If anything Ware is our back most not afraid to make a hit. He tries to lay out guys every time he runs. Dude was a beast out there last night.
Without Mett's two turnovers, this would have been a very different football game. They cost us 3 - 7 points and handed them 7.
