Observations: 2025 A-Day Practice
Auburn football finished spring ball Saturday with a practice that had a lot more eyeballs on it than usual. Here's what we learned.
AUBURN — It was a practice.
Sure, there were fans in the stands. Yes, it was in Jordan-Hare Stadium. The Tigers did a Tiger Walk, like they do for several Saturdays in the fall. They sold concessions. There were special visitors on the sidelines.
And the whole thing was sponsored by Golden Flake.
But, between the lines on Pat Dye Field on Saturday, A-Day was just a practice.
Auburn didn’t hide any of that in the buildup to its annual spring finale. Like many programs across the country, the traditional televised and ticketed scrimmage has faded. The product had become watered down. Coaches didn’t want to put anything — or anyone — out on tape before the transfer portal.
Hugh Freeze doesn’t even like spring practice in the first place, preferring NFL-style OTAs in the summer.
But A-Day was still on the schedule, and Auburn did its new version of it inside Jordan-Hare Stadium on a gorgeous Saturday afternoon in April.
It looked and felt just like the same practice Auburn had two days earlier, down the street at the performance center. That didn’t stop a fan base, hungry to see some improvement after four straight losing seasons, from showing up.
“Man, what a beautiful day in Jordan-Hare,” Freeze said afterwards. “Our fans showed up. I think we were pretty clear that it would be a practice, and they still showed up. That just tells you about the Auburn people and how great they are and the support they have for us.
“Thought it was one of the better springs that I've been a part of, and a lot of credit goes to our staff and our leadership team for demanding accountability to the standards.”
Auburn went over an hour in front of the fans Saturday, before ending with a team huddle and breaking off into groups for autograph sessions. The Tigers had individual position drills, special teams work, 1-on-1 action and pass skeleton action before getting some 11-on-11 reps in an extended red-zone situation.
Nothing earth-shattering happened on the field. There weren’t any takeaways that will drastically change the way you view Auburn football this fall.
But, let’s be honest: You weren’t getting that in a traditional spring game, either.
What you got, instead, is the final practice for an Auburn team that says it likes where it’s at — even after four straight losing seasons — and feels like it’s closer to contending again.
“You have to have top-10 recruiting classes in this league to form an elite roster,” Freeze said. “I felt like we could do that at Auburn, and we have in the two recruiting classes we've had. And the roster, therefore, looks different. I thought it would take three to really have the roster to where it rivals those of the elite in this conference, and that's probably still accurate.
“But I do feel optimistic that, with the two we've had, we can compete — should compete — this year. So it does look different. Let's go line up and see what we've got.”
Here’s what we saw from what Auburn has got right now.
Deuce Knight: 5-star freshman… both of those words matter
Auburn decided to hold out junior transfer quarterback and expected 2025 starter Jackson Arnold from practice Saturday after he suffered a minor hamstring injury two days earlier.
While that had to be disappointing for fans in attendance who wanted a first look at Arnold, the Tigers didn’t want to risk anything with almost five months to go before actual competitive football starts.
“He's feeling fine,” Freeze said. “He just didn't need to run today and risk it. There’s no defect in the hamstring. You certainly don't want to create one with one day left, going into an offseason where he needs to be ready to go.”
Because of that, Deuce Knight was the only scholarship quarterback available for practice — and one of only two quarterbacks, period. (Sophomore walk-on John Colvin, for what it’s worth, did make some nice throws Saturday.)
Knight got the bulk of the reps in practice, ranging from the pass skeleton work all the way to the full 11-on-11 red-zone drills. The results were mixed.