After a 3-0 start that includes a top 15 win in Arlington, Texas against Oregon, Gus Malzahn and the Auburn Tigers set up for their SEC opener against the 17th ranked Texas A&M.
In his Tuesday morning press conference, Gus Malzahn opened by giving high praises to the Texas A&M run defense. The Aggies average average of 83.7 yards per game, and through their first three games has the 3rd ranked rush defense in the SEC.
Auburn runs for an average of 281.7 yards on the ground per game which is 2nd in the SEC. Auburn ranks dead last in the SEC in pass offense, so the SEC opener for these two teams will very much be a game won in the trenches.
Moving towards injuries, Auburn has suffered quite a few through fall camp and their opening slate of games. The good news, however, is that Prince Tega, Derrick Brown, Seth Williams, and Shedrick Jackson will practice this week to see how they are in the their recovery process. All four of those injuries are still day-to-day but could be subject to change depending on how their practices this week go.
In addition, Gus has confirmed that Derick Hall is not going to play this week in College Station. The last injury covered in the press conference was Anthony Schwartz and his hand. Gus stated that Schwartz will have some sort of protection on his hand this weekend but he's hoping it won't be the "club" he has worn. Gus is optimistic towards Schwartz because despite wearing a large brace on his hand, he still caught a pass and should expect even more throws to him.
Auburn's rushing attack has been the main focus of the offense since Gus has arrived on the plains; however, in recent years Gus has been under some attack for overworking a singular running back and leading to injuries through the season because of the workload. Gus has been addressing that problem this season and seemed almost desperate to figure out a better scheme to give Whitlow some rest. Gus stated in his press conference regarding Shivers rushing for over 100 yards against Kent State, that he's very pleased with the running backs and that they've shown they have the experience to run the ball and take some of the workload off of Whitlow. Gus even threw DJ Williams into the mix despite the true freshman running back not playing a game yet this season due to injury.
The biggest thing to watch from the offense in the upcoming weeks isn't a clear number 1, number 2 and number 3 running back but rather a mix of each one on the roster and lots of situational substitutions and play calls.
As expected, Bo Nix was a huge talking point throughout the press conference and, for the most part, was featured heavily in the concluding comments made by Gus. The biggest question mark for Nix is if he's fully ready for a true road game in a hostile environment such as Kyle Field, but Gus believes in his preparation methods to have Nix fully prepared.
He stated that one of the methods of preparation was to simulate crowd noise to make it as realistic to the 100,000-plus that will fill in Kyle Field on any given Saturday. Because of Bo Nix's ability to handle the spotlight and stay at a very humble level, Gus Malzahn and the entire team believe in him and his ability to stay level-headed and lead the Tigers through College Station.
The Auburn Tigers will play Texas A&M at 2:30 CT on CBS.
