Ole Miss Game Report Card

[StatTiger 3,188]

On a night the defense played its worst game of the season, the offense and special teams were prepared to carry Auburn to a victory on the road. Coach Rhett Lashlee called a brilliant game and opened up the offense during the second half, knowing more points might be needed to secure the win. During the first half, 66.7 percent of Sean White's pass attempts were within 10-yards of the line of scrimmage. During the second half, 53.8 percent of his pass attempts were beyond 10-yards of the line of scrimmage. Though he only attempted 22 passes, 7 of them resulted in 16-yards or more. Eight different players caught a pass, and five different players ran the ball. The Tigers finally broke their 20-game drought of not attempting a pass to the tight end with Jalen Harris scoring on a brilliantly designed play. Rhett Lashlee likely had every Auburn fan screaming at the initial formation when Chandler Cox lined up behind center.

The defense played a horrible game but did make some critical adjustments during the second half. Four years ago, Texas A&M destroyed Auburn by compiling 15 impact plays during the game. By halftime of tonight's game, the Rebels had 12 impact plays, finishing with 18 for the night. This was the most impact plays surrendered by an Auburn defense over the past 25 years. Ole Miss had 357-yards and 22 points at the half and were contained to 213-yards and 7 points during the final 30 minutes. Auburn probably had more missed tackles in this game than the first seven combined, but they did not quit. The effort was still there, and they made three critical stops during the second half. The Auburn defense held Ole Miss on downs twice, and Josh Holsey made a fantastic play on the receiver to record the only turnover the game.

Not enough can be said about Kamryn Pettway and how he has made the most of his opportunity this season. Despite carrying the ball in only 6 of Auburn's eight games, the big sophomore running back has 933-yards rushing on only 148 carries this season. He will most certainly become Gus Malzahn's 11th consecutive 1000-yard rusher at the RB position. He is a bigger version of James Bostic, who was also a nasty and physical runner nearly 25 years ago. The scary element of Pettway's success is he is still adjusting to being a running back at the collegiate level. Week by week, Pettway continues to improve as a runner, and we have not seen the best of this young man at Auburn. This was a great victory for a young team competing on the road against the best passing offense in the conference. This team could have easily folded, but they continued to play with passion and determination, allowing their talent to finally rise to the occasion. It was another great growing opportunity for the 2016 Auburn Tigers, which will make them even stronger as they move forward to Vanderbilt next Saturday.

War Eagle!

Game #8 Statistical Evaluation (Ole Miss Game)

Offensive Report Card
01) Avg 6-yards per play on 1^st down: [7.97] pass
02) Convert at least 40% of 3^rd downs:  [50.0%] pass
03) Avg at least 4.5 yards per rush:  [5.90] pass
04) Score on at least 1/3 of possessions:  [72.7%] pass
05) Keep 3 and out series under 33%:  [9.1%] pass
06) Average 8.0 yards per pass attempt: [11.2 yds] pass
07) Score at least 75% inside red zone:  [100.0%] pass
08) TD red zone above 60%:  [60.0%] pass
09) Avg at least 30-yards per possession:  [50.4 yds] pass
10) 40% of offensive snaps part of scoring drives:  [79.7%] pass
11) TD / Turnover ratio above 1.6:  [4/0] pass
12) TD ratio of at least 1 every 17 snaps:  [18.5] fail
13) At least 8 impact plays:  [11] pass
14) At least 2 big plays:  [5] pass
15) Pass rating of at least 126.3:  [177.5] pass

Score: 14 of 15 (100.0%) Pass
 
Defensive Report Card:
01) Avg under 6-yards per play on 1^st down: [5.76] pass
02) Convert below 35% of 3^rd downs:  [43.7%] fail
03) Avg at least 4.0 yards per rush or less:  [3.39] pass
04) Score  1/3 of possessions or below:  [54.5%] fail
05) Keep 3 and out series above 33%:  [9.1%] fail
06) Average below 7.5 yards per pass attempt: [7.88 yds] fail
07) Score below 75% inside red zone:  [75.0%] fail
08) TD red zone below 60%:  [50.0%] pass
09) Avg under 30-yards per possession:  [51.8 yds] fail
10) Less than 40% of offensive snaps part of scoring drives:  [66.7%] fail
11) TD / Turnover ratio below 1.6:  [3/1] fail
12) TD ratio of at least 1 every 30 snaps:  [30.0] pass
13) Less than 8 impact plays:  [18] fail
14) No more than 2 big plays allowed: [0] pass
15) Pass rating below 125.0:  [140.6] fail

Score: 5 of 15 (33.3%) Fail

Special Teams Report Card:
1) Punt Average (Above 41.3):  [43.0] pass
2) Punt Return Defense (Below 7.8 YPR): [0.0] pass
3) Punt Return Offense (Above 9.8 YPR): [10.0] pass
4) Kick-Return Defense (Below 21.2 YPR): [27.7] fail
5) Kick-Return Offense (Above 22.3 YPR): [17.0] fail
6) PAT’s (100%): [4 of 4] pass
7) FG Pct (75% or above): [4/4] pass    

Score: 5 of 7 (71.4%) Pass
 

* 50% is a passing score.

[dp4au 2]

Thanks Stat. The report card was pretty much as expected. pleased with the adjustments at the half. Great win with the offense carrying the load tonight/

[AUGoo 2,659]

Did not see the game. ( Bammer having a 50th)

Did not realize just how bad the D was used tonight.

Go O!!!

Glad to see these guys picking up the slack!

[triangletiger 1,599]

D struggled tonight, but a lot of credit has to go Chad Kelly and the Ole Miss receivers for the effort they brought.  They gave Auburn their best shot.  Good game for the AU defense to learn from and get better.

[wdefromtx 3,159]

They put 43 up on bama so I knew they could be dangerous. 

[CleCoTiger 1,957]

I'm not that down on the defense tonight. Seems to me that the Ole Miss offense is actually pretty darn good.  Ain't like bammer shut 'em down either. (Ole Miss had 523 yards against the laundry detergent, 570 against AU. Scored less against our Tigers.)

[McLoofus 35,182]

4 hours ago, CleCoTiger said:

I'm not that down on the defense tonight. Seems to me that the Ole Miss offense is actually pretty darn good.  Ain't like bammer shut 'em down either. (Ole Miss had 523 yards against the laundry detergent, 570 against AU. Scored less against our Tigers.)

They missed some tackles, but I think Ole Miss still puts up numbers without that. Kelly was a surgeon and his receivers were catching everything. (Well, they did have trouble a couple times connecting when the WRs were wide open.) Kelly was getting rid of the ball quickly, too. I was naive in thinking their offense wouldn't produce against our defense.

[weagl1 1,781]

Kelly was as good as I have seen last night and those big receivers are studs.  But our guys never folded and came up with some critical plays in the second half to get the win.  You go on the road in the SEC and you are going to get challenged.  They were.  They passed the test.  

[hutchids 227]

I thoughtthe special teams would have gotten a bonus point for monty blocking the PAT. Still good all aroung performance. Glad to see thd d play hard even though it wasnt going well for them.

[shabby 1,956]

This game looked a whole lot like the Alabama Ole Miss game to me. Big yards put up by the Ole Miss team on both teams. adjustments and turnovers making the difference in both games.

[au701948 996]

Here is hoping that the D does not regress to this type play for the balance of the season and that CRL rediscovers the Tight End as a receiver more often.

[lionheartkc 6,150]

Statistically, the D was bad, but watching the play on the field, it wasn't nearly as bad as it looks in paper. Frequently, Ole Miss's receivers made incredible catches with our defenders draped all over them. The only real negatives were that we didn't get enough pressure on Kelly, which was surprising with their line in disarray, and that there were a couple of badly missed tackles.

Hey @StatTiger. This might be a good week for first and second half report cards for the D. We fixed a lot at the half.

Now we have 3 weeks to fix the mistakes before the iron bowl. One week at a time. Better every week.

Edited October 31, 2016 by lionheartkc

[alexava 6,973]

Kelly looked like a top 5 pick to me.

[Sully to Beasley 643]

Auburn played against an NFL caliber QB and very talented receivers last night. Yes, the defense was torched in the first half. However, the coaching staff made adjustments in the second half and the defense allowed the most potent offense in the SEC only 7 points the entire second half. Holding that Ole Miss offense to 29 points for the entire game was a win for the defense.

[lala 327]

Stat, I'd like to see you do a analysis of Ole Miss throw to the RB out f the backfield and what our LB's need to do to cover that.   

The screen also killed us.  

[Eagle Eye 7 2,535]

The only problem with the defense stats is they are not a true comparison in this case. This OM team has put up numbers like this against everyone this year. The only game besides ours that they did not get 30 point was on a Saturday  night game in Baton Rouge and the weather probably played a part in that one.Actually we played this team better than anyone else has this year especially in their house. Not picking but when you go against good offenses you expect to see an increase in yardage. The thing I liked most was they fact that when they got in the redzone where a team would normally rely more on a ground game they could not move it on the ground. D did miss some tackles that they have been making this year, but it was not a "bad" defensive night. Like others have pointed out, just a few weeks ago this same unit put 600 plus yards and 43 points against the number #1 rated team in the country. Even Saban would have been thrilled to have his defense preform as well as ours when they played OM. WDE

[wareagle13 88]

The fact that they had 18 impact plays and 0 big plays astounds me. Those intermediate passes ate us, they found the gaps and exposed them but our D crashed on them immediately to limit yac from going big. That's gotta be one of the biggest stats in my opinion. Opinion stat? have you ever seen a team give up that many impact plays but none of them turned big?

Edited October 30, 2016 by wareagle13

[Strychnine 1,802]

7 hours ago, McLoofus said:

They missed some tackles, but I think Ole Miss still puts up numbers without that. Kelly was a surgeon and his receivers were catching everything. (Well, they did have trouble a couple times connecting when the WRs were wide open.) Kelly was getting rid of the ball quickly, too. I was naive in thinking their offense wouldn't produce against our defense.

 

Defense missed tackles, but was generally in position to make the play more often than not.  After several years of watching WR's running around wide open all over the place, I still consider even being in position to miss the tackle a substantial improvement.  They took advantage of defensive mistakes, but Ole Miss' offense had to earn most of that yardage by playing well.

[doc4aday 1,887]

I am not down on our defense whatsoever.  They did what they had to do when the situation could have turned really bad for them.  I think we all were in the clouds after the way we destroyed the piggies a week ago. If OM had a decent defense, they would be a top 15 team without a doubt. I do hope that OM will be firing on all cylinders when they face TAMU. With a win over TAMU, this will open the door for us a good deal more. We need to take care of business with Vandy, UGA and AA&M in order to put us in a position to do a flush down on the turds,

I may get some boos over this one, but I think bammer needs to be undefeated when we face them. My reasoning is that when we beat them with them being #1 in the polls, will give us our best chance to earn our way to the top 4 slots. It does not matter if we are #1 or #4, we just need to get in. Nothing would give me more pleasure than to have to play Clemson during the play offs and put a butt hurt on them!

I only got to see bits and pieces of the game in that I was so tired from getting only 3 hours of sleep that past 2 nights. Does anyone know when the game will be available on Utube?

It is really nice to be able to watch games on Utube. I can run it through one of my big screen TVs of which is a much better picture that watching it on TV the day of the game. I like to watch both, but just find the picture quality is fantastic when watching it through Utube. Let's put on our hard hats and get it done.

[AU64 10,122]

To me the big PASS on the list of defensive FAILS was the less than 60% red zone TDs.    I've always said that yardage alone does not bother me too much as long as we keep them out of the end zone.    So....Ole Miss sets passing records and runs up and down the field but only scores 29 points which not many these days....and loses the game.   

Some of the defensive failures (poor tackling for example) made the game more stressful than necessary but a win on the road is always a joyous occasion. 

[GBAU83 212]

6 hours ago, doc4aday said:

I may get some boos over this one, but I think bammer needs to be undefeated when we face them. My reasoning is that when we beat them with them being #1 in the polls, will give us our best chance to earn our way to the top 4 slots. It does not matter if we are #1 or #4, we just need to get in. Nothing would give me more pleasure than to have to play Clemson during the play offs and put a butt hurt on them!

Doc,

 I agree - I love for bammer to be undefeated when we beat them, makes the win so much better.  The way several previously undefeated teams lost this weekend opens the door for us if we can get to the SEC championship and win there.  That should be enough to get us in the playoffs with our strength of schedule.  But let's get Vandy first.

[alexava 6,973]

I won't lose any sleep on bammer/ LSU. It's LSU and or ole miss / Tex AnM. That I think about. I think one or both would get them. 

[AUcivE09 582]

Even on a night that Chad Kelly played the best game of his life and the best Ole Miss has ever seen - AU won and had several key defensive plays. I think that speaks volumes about where this team is nationally. If CK played every game like he did this past Saturday then AU/OM may have had Gameday present as opposed to SECN coverage.

[McLoofus 35,182]

12 minutes ago, AUcivE09 said:

If CK played every game like he did this past Saturday then AU/OM may have had Gameday present as opposed to SECN coverage.

Still pissed about that. 

[AuburnNTexas 7,127]

We just played against the best QB in the SEC. The D-line actually didn't do that bad a job he just gets rid of the ball very quickly and very accurately. Missed tackles was a problem but Kelley being so accurate on back shoulder throws when we actually had solid coverage was almost surreal. This was 1st time D wasn't great but I think Kelley and Ole Miss game plan had an awful lot to do with it.

I think you will see the D rebound well from this game and become even better.