Practice Observations: It's all about "the little things" for Auburn
The Tigers can't afford to look past South Alabama in Week 3. There's too much at stake for a team with a lot to work on before SEC play.
AUBURN — It would be easy to look past Week 3 for Auburn.
The Tigers went on the road and beat a good Baylor team — at least on offense — in a pressure-packed season opener. Then they avoided a letdown and dominated Ball State a week later.
Now, people around Auburn are already starting to turn toward Week 4. Oklahoma looks like it’s much-improved, and that should make for a huge SEC opener next Saturday afternoon in Norman. The Jackson Arnold bowl will be a big one.
But Auburn doesn’t have the luxury of looking ahead. This is a team that lost to New Mexico State two seasons ago. This is a team that also knows that a traditional SEC power lost to a Group of Five in-state opponent just last weekend.
South Alabama has been to a bowl game in three straight years and is only a couple of years removed from absolutely thumping Oklahoma State in an early-season game. The first-ever meeting between the Tigers and the Jaguars should feature plenty of energy from the visitors.
Auburn has to match that Saturday and take care of business before conference play begins. Besides, it’s not like the Tigers have been flawless in the first two weeks. When it comes to the finer details, they want to see better.
“It’s hard to sit here and act like we weren’t solid, but there are things on the film that I think we need to improve,” Hugh Freeze said Monday. “We’ll go to work this week to try and improve that as we host what I think is a very good G5 football team in South Alabama.”
After talking to Freeze on Monday afternoon, we got a chance to watch practice Tuesday morning and talk to several players afterwards.
Here’s the latest on what we’ve learned from the Tigers over the last two days at the football facility, starting with injury updates and our notebook from practice viewing.
What we saw and heard during Tuesday’s practice
Running back Damari Alston (shoulder) was in a yellow non-contact jersey and was a limited participant. Freeze said Monday that Alston would try to get back to action this week and will be a game-time decision for South Alabama on Saturday.
In case you haven’t heard yet, running back Durell Robinson is out indefinitely after “a freak injury.” Freeze said Monday that Robinson “had a collection of blood like I've never seen, in all of my years coaching, on his thigh” when he woke up Sunday morning. Robinson was rushed to Birmingham, where doctors made a “pretty good incision” to relieve it.
Jeremiah Cobb will likely carry the bulk of the load at running back against South Alabama. Freshman Omar Mabson was the second-team running back in a team drill during the viewing window Tuesday. However, it appeared that the third running back was walk-on Justin Jones. Freshman Alvin Henderson was with the scout team during practice Tuesday.