By Brant Daughtry
Revenge Game, Kind Of
New Mexico State is an interesting team. Their head coach is Jerry Kill, who took over this year after spending the last few years at TCU. He’s known as a program builder; a guy who takes programs who are in the dumps and makes them respectable again. He’s done that for the Aggies this year, taking a team that was 7-6 last season and giving them eight wins to this point in the season, including a six game win streak that Auburn expects to bring to an end this weekend. They’re adored by certain metrics since they’ve routinely beaten down teams that aren’t any good. They haven’t had any kind of success against halfway decent teams though, and they haven’t played a power 5 team yet this year.
It is worth noting though, this is a team playing really good football at the moment. As said, the team is on a six game win streak. While Auburn is expected to win, as they should be, this will probably be a tougher opponent than the last two games Auburn has played, even if just for the fact that they want to be out there.
Their quarterback is Diego Pavia, one of the best duel threat QB’s in college football. He’s over 2,000 yards passing this season, and over 800 yards rushing which leads the team. He’s a legitimate threat and a guy that expects to win. Whoever I list here is far less important than Pavia, the engine that makes this thing go. It should be noted though, Pavia was hurt in NMSU’s last game, and has been limited in practice this week. If he’s in question, Auburn’s job gets a lot easier.
Players To Watch For:
Wide Receiver Trent Hudson, #14- New Mexico State likes to spread it around, so none of their receivers numbers is super gaudy. Hudson isn’t the leading receiver in terms of yards, but he’s impossible to ignore in the red zone. He leads the team in touchdown catches with seven, and has caught at least one pass in all but two games this year. He’s a big body at 6′ 3″ 180 lbs, and a guy that Auburn needs to work to lock down.
Linebacker Keyshaun Elliot, #44- The defense for NMSU isn’t full of standouts, but there are a lot of solid guys. Elliot playing in the middle is one of them. He leads the team in tackles with 78 and tackles for loss with 7.5. He’s good with blitzes and knows how to read a run scheme.
Yeah yeah, it’s a paycheck game. But I’d urge fans to not take this game lightly. Auburn is expected to win by a lot, with the Tigers being favored somewhere around 24 points depending on your preferred book. But like I said earlier, this is a team that can jump up and bite you, especially if you’re looking ahead.
It’s time for a little reflection. When looking at Auburn’s overall record, the raw outcomes aren’t that shocking. I said at the beginning of the season that I expected Auburn to finish the regular season with seven wins, with six and eight being a possibility. That still rings true. If Auburn loses to New Mexico State, then questions have to be asked, but no one expects that to happen. So I’m sticking with my prediction of seven wins, even though anything can happen in a home Iron Bowl.
The path to get here though, is something worthy of analyzing. That four game losing streak wasn’t unexpected, but it was brutal. The offense looked far worse than anyone expected, especially when considering the past that Hugh Freeze has with offensive success. The talent gap excuse was exhausted, and the honeymoon phase came to an end.
Then Hugh Freeze got more involved with the week-to-week game planning, and the offense changed. Now, it should be noted, that the competition Auburn played git significantly easier. There’s no denying that. But they did change a lot with their offensive scheme, most notably sticking with Payton Thorne as QB1. That was far from the only change though.
It struck me as weird that, while Freeze trotted out the talent gap excuse over and over, the offense continued to run plays that required the most talent to execute, the RPO fade being the most prominent example in my head, rather than help out that which needed to be helped. Since the Mississippi State game, the game where Freeze started saying he was becoming more involved, those more complex passing schemes designed to help less talented receivers have been far more prominent.
The question of why it took so long for a career play caller to get involved in play calling is a valid one, and I don’t buy that anyone seriously believes it’s acceptable for a head coach to foley focus on recruiting rather than try to win the actual game he’ll be coaching in that week. But the answer to that question doesn’t matter much now. The thing that matters is if you can do it against a team that has a pulse. New Mexico State will answer that question. Afterwords, you’ll have to do it against a championship-caliber team. We’ll learn a lot over the next two weeks.
