Upon Further Review - Mississippi State Game

[StatTiger 3,188]

• Auburn's opponent has converted less than 30 percent of their 3rd down attempts during the first, second and third quarters this season. They have converted nearly 43 percent during the fourth quarter.

 

• Stop throwing on third & one. Auburn is 0-4 this season, throwing on 3rd down with one yard to convert.

 

• Halfway through the regular season, Kerryon Johnson and Kamryn Pettway are both on pace to rush for 1000-yards. KJ as 538-yards on 105 carries and Pettway has amassed 505-yards on 91 attempts. The two combined are averaging 173.8 yards per game.

 

• After holding MSU to 2.8 yards per play during the first-half, the Bulldogs averaged 5.5 yards per play during the second-half.

 

• 48.1 percent of the snaps defended by the Auburn defense has resulted in 2-yards or less. Last year through 6 games, it was 41.9 percent.

 

• During the first 3 games, Auburn had a negative play during 13 of 104 first down snaps. During the last 3 games it has dropped to 5 negative plays on 106 first down snaps.

 

• Auburn ran the ball 85.7 percent of the time on first down against MSU. It was 79.2 percent during the first-half.

 

• Last season through 6 games the Auburn offense produced 24 impact plays. This season they have 51 through the first 6 games. It breaks down to 28 passing and 23 rushing.

 

• During the first 3 games, the three most targeted receivers were Tony Stevens, Marcus Davis and Will Hastings. During the last 3 games it has been Tony Stevens, Ryan Davis and Kyle Davis.

 

• During the first-half of the regular season, Sean White has completed 72.9 percent of his 1st and 2nd down passes combined.

 

• When Auburn totals at least 3 first downs during a possession, they have scored on 21 of 27 possessions.

 

• Last season through 6 games, Auburn's offense gained at least 40-yards during 38.1 percent of their possessions. This season it has increased to 54.8 percent.

 

• Last season through 6 games, Auburn's defense held their opponent to under 20-yards during a possession, 38.5 percent of the time. This season it has increased to 56.0 percent.

 

• Last season Sean White completed 42.5 percent of his passes beyond 10-yards of the line of scrimmage, including 34.5 percent beyond 20-yards. This season he has completed 56.5 percent of his passes beyond 10-yards of the LOS, including 50 percent beyond 20-yards. Auburn needs to take advantage of their talented WR's and success this season.

 

• Auburn's statistical reports cards through mid-season last season had the offense at 48.3 percent, the defense at 41.1 percent and special teams at 75.0 percent. This season the offense is at 56.7 percent, the defense at 71.1 percent and special teams at 66.7 percent. The drop in special teams is primarily on the return game (kickoffs and punt returns).

 

• Auburn's defense is allowing 3.5 yards per rush during the first-half and 4.9 yards during the second-half. This might be why Auburn went to a Bear-front during the second-half of the MSU game. This needs to improve before an opponent takes advantage of it down the road.

 

• Last year at mid-season, Auburn had scored 17 touchdowns, while allowing 18. This season they have scored 21, while allowing 9.

 

• Auburn is currently averaging 3.3 points per forced-turnover and are allowing only .7 points per turnover surrendered.

 

• During the first 2 seasons with Gus Malzahn as the head coach, Auburn averaged at least 6-yards per play on 1st down during 59.3 percent of their games. During the past two seasons it has dropped to 21.0 percent of their games. This won't improve as long as Auburn is running the football 80-85 percent of the time on first down.

 

• The Auburn defense has forced "3 & out" more than 33 percent of the time during the past 4 consecutive games. This is the longest such streak since the 2008 season. If you are not forcing a high number of turnovers, you'd better be good at forcing "3 & outs".

 

• Prior to the last two games, the last time Auburn had back-to-back "under 300-yard" games was the first two games of the 2009 season.

 

• Kamryn Pettway's 100-yard performance was the 66th under a Gus Malzahn offense (86 games). There were 64 during the 142 games under Pat Dye and 58 during the 125 games under Tommy Tuberville.

 

• Based on yards per game, Kamryn Pettway is No. 3 in the SEC in rushing and Kerryon Johnson is No. 6.

 

• Sean White remains the No. 3 rated passer in the conference after another solid performance in conference play. He is also No. 3 in the SEC in generating an impact play in the passing game with a ratio of 1 every 4.26 attempts. The league average is 1 every 5.72 attempts. White is No. 2 in the conference in producing first downs with 39.4 percent of his attempts resulting in a first down. The league average is 32.3 percent. He needs to be attempting 25 passes per game to take advantage of his success.

 

• Auburn dropped to No. 2 in rushing in the SEC, currently averaging 262.8 yards per game.

 

• Auburn's defense is now No. 4 in total defense and scoring defense within the SEC.

 

• Auburn is No. 3 in the SEC in third down offense and defense.

 

• Carl Lawson is No. 8 in the SEC in tackles for loss per game.

 

• Kerryon Johnson is No. 3 in All-Purpose yards per game.

 

• Daniel Carlson is No. 1 in the SEC in FG percentage (92.9%).

 

• Auburn is No. 1 in the SEC in punt-return defense.

 

• Auburn is No. 1 in the SEC in the least amount of penalty yardage and is the 3rd least penalized team in the league. This is great news considering the amount of youth contributing this season.

 

• Auburn's defense is No. 3 in the SEC in red zone TD percentage.

 

• Auburn is No. 4 in the SEC in producing an average of 16.5 plays of 10-yards or more per game. This includes an average of 13.5 such plays against Power-5 competition.

 

War Eagle!

[aubearcat 2,137]

Solid stuff as always. 

[aujeff11 6,243]

7 minutes ago, StatTiger said:

Auburn is No. 1 in the SEC in the least amount of penalty yardage and is the 3rd least penalized team in the league. This is great news considering the amount of youth contributing this season.

Amazing 

[AU64 10,122]

Very interesting stats......looking more and more that the Clemson and TAMU games were not a good benchmark to draw conclusions about what this team is capable of doing.   I still look back as the Clemson game as a game we could have won....and Clemson is looking like the real thing this year....better than I expected.  LSU was a game where the offense failed to close the deal in the red zone despite 400 yards of offense.  Perhaps that is behind us.

Looking forward....., every game appears winnable if things come together for the team....and of course, several are loseable if we can't get a little better handle on the mistakes.

Thanks Stat for digging in the weed to find the information and make it available to us.

[IndianTiger 95]

Its fun to watch the team grow and get confident on both sides of the ball, especially on D, since we haven't seen it in almost 10 years. Sean White might be the most accurate QB we have had in a long long time, I think. 

[AU-24 3,063]

45 minutes ago, aujeff11 said:

Amazing 

A sign of great coaching!

[doug3020 842]

This is the first team since 2013 that you can actually see the team improving on the field. We aren't world beaters, but it appears we're heading in the right direction. Much different feel than last year and early this season. Hope this continues. WDE!

[oracle79 3,569]

2 hours ago, StatTiger said:

Stop throwing on third & one. Auburn is 0-4 this season, throwing on 3rd down with one yard to convert.

The fact that we throw on 3rd and 1 doesn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that we try to "get cute" and catch the defense sleeping and complete a homerun.  If we threw a quick out like the TD pass to Ryan Davis, or to Cox down on the goaline, I'm perfectly fine with that, or getting SW on a boot or naked and giving him some RPO, that works too.  But, really if you've been sticking it up their yingyang the whole drive and making them like it, then go ahead and stick up there again and continue on with your drive.

[Auburn2Eugene 2,317]

7 hours ago, StatTiger said:

• Stop throwing on third & one. Auburn is 0-4 this season, throwing on 3rd down with one yard to convert.

I dont understand why this counts negatively against you. Looking at this stat I would think we are O for 4 when passing on 3rd and 1 for the season when its simply not the case. We threw on 3rd and 1 yesterday, yet the stat remains the same. Why is that? I just dont get it...

[gr82b4au 5,568]

Wow. We ran the ball 86% of the time on first down. Looks like we are just executing better. 

[ArgoEagle 1,773]

I thought the difference in our efficiency on O was that we got rid of all the motion, eye candy, bubble screens, we only ran 1 or 2 jet sweeps. We ran an in your face type of offense, which best suits Sean's skillset and the tempo was turned way up compared to the first few games. Kudos to Rhett and Gus for finally figuring this out the sixth game of the season.

The 2 wrinkles I liked the best was the short screen pass to Cox and the pick play we ran to get the TD pass to Ryan Davis. These changes gives the defense a couple more options to have to deal with. This looks way better and gives us more hope of reaching the 9 or 10 win plateau than we had before.

[SumterAubie 3,031]

Bear front?

[leglessdan 1,934]

Looks like a nicely balanced attack, with an above average D. Keep growing boys...the wins will too.

[bigbird 60,500]

2 hours ago, SumterAubie said:

Bear front?

5 man line

5   3  0   3   5

 T  G  C  G  T

[SumterAubie 3,031]

thanks Bird.

[Auhud08 596]

I thought i saw us use Okie a good bit too in the 2nd half? 

[bigbird 60,500]

4 hours ago, Auhud08 said:

I thought i saw us use Okie a good bit too in the 2nd half? 

For those wondering about okie

          B      B

6  5        0        5    7

     T  G  C  G  T

 

 

[augolf1716 21,109]

Thought it was bear 46 defense

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

I don't see why we don't just run wildcat KJ up the middle and move Sean to wideout if we don't think we can get a 3rd and 1 from the shotgun. It's like we completely forgot about the wildcat (I'll take a JF3 package though, just saying)

[Linayus 676]

It's probably been said hundreds of times already - but this defense with the offense we had in 2013/14 would have been a dream. Maybe even enough for back to back SEC titles and NC titles. But.. wish in one hand and sh-t in the other, right? lol

Still - love the numbers (most of them anyway) and love the future of this team. Gus has definitely saved his butt so far. Let's hope that continues as we really hit the meat of the SEC play!

[doc4aday 1,887]

Great job!! I know I can count on you to deliver rock solid information throughout the season. Thanks my friend!!