Auburn survives upset bid in OT by 40-point underdog Jacksonville State
Auburn survived an upset bid by Jacksonville State on Saturday to win 27-20 in overtime.
Auburn, No. 6 in the latest AP Top 25, was a 40-point favorite over its lower-division foe, a team it paid over $500,000 to play. The Tigers did not perfom like a 40-point favorite.
Had Jacksonville State won the game, it would not have been a surprise. It held the lead more than once and, to an uninitiated observer, it looked like it was in the same class as Auburn.
Auburn won the game on a three-yard touchdown run by Peyton Barber in the first overtime. Jacksonville State, which got the ball after Auburn did, got inside the Auburn 10 via a pass interference penalty but a huge sack by Cassanova McKinzy on JSU QB Eli Jenkins made a fourth-down conversion for a touchdown virtually impossible. JSU's deep pass to the end zone was complete, but the receiver, Josh Barge, was out of bounds. Ballgame.
After JSU, a school located in Alabama and not Jacksonville, Florida, took the lead with over five minutes to go in the fourth quarter but Auburn forced overtime with 39 seconds left when quarterback Jeremy Johnson hit receiver Melvin Ray in the back corner of the end zone.
The touchdown and ensuing extra point tied the game at 20-20, a tie that happened thanks to a 17-yard punt by Jacksonville State. The Gamecocks had gotten the ball back from Auburn via a fumble with 3:20 to go but failed to convert a first down.
While JSU had time and one timeout after Auburn tied the game in regulation, the school inexplicably ran the rest of the time off the clock to go to overtime. It's no guarantee that JSU would have gotten in position for a game-winning field goal, but given the original improbability of the situation, it would have been worth it to see if there was any magic left.
Johnson, in his second game as Auburn's starter, made some poor decisions again. He threw three interceptions against Louisville in Week 1 and threw two against Jacksonville State. His ability to decipher coverages is still a huge question mark as Auburn visits LSU in Week 3. While Jacksonville State's defense played remarkably well, it doesn't have near the talent level that LSU's does.
It's a correct and unsurprising statement that Auburn coach Gus Malzahn said after the game that his team has "a lot" of things to work on before it faces LSU. And it's also important to note that Louisville, a team that Auburn had trouble putting away in its 31-24 win, lost at home to Houston on Saturday. While the Tigers are 2-0, it's not an impressive 2-0 at all.
But the early season struggles won't matter if Auburn has a successful SEC run. While the JSU escape will always linger, especially when discussing the College Football Playoff, Auburn can put a large strikethrough over it with an SEC West title. Still, it's hard to call the Tigers an SEC contender through the first two weeks of the season. We'll find out against LSU and Mississippi State over the next two weeks if the real Auburn is better than the one we've seen so far.
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Nick Bromberg is the assistant editor of Dr. Saturday on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
