After Chandler Wooten recorded a spectacular interception on a throwback pass to Houston quarterback Clayton Tune, Bryan Harsin decided he wanted to go for the kill shot with Auburn leading 13-10 in the fourth quarter. So he dialed up a pass for TJ Finley.

Finley overshot his open receiver by at least 10 yards. Finley overthrew an Auburn receiver two plays later, and after beginning the drive at Houston's 49-yard line, the Tigers punted.

"The encouraging things are the throws he made," Harsin said after the game. "The ones that he didn't, we just got to give our guys a chance."

It was a microcosm of Finley's performance in the 17-13 loss to the Cougars in the Birmingham Bowl. At times, he looked on target, hitting Kobe Hudson and John Samuel Shenker with perfectly placed passes and hitting the former with a touchdown in the third quarter on a swing route.

"I thought the decision making wasn't bad; you know, he was going to the right guy," Harsin said of Finley's day. "So, we were making the right decisions. We were throwing to the right guys. Now, we've got to execute a little bit better on the throws."

Asked to throw the ball 37 times, Finley completed just 19 of his attempts for 227 yards and the one touchdown. It wasn't a brilliant performance. Far from it, actually. But with a limited offensive line, two-plus games in the system, and still seemingly limping from an injury suffered during the Iron Bowl, it wasn't woeful.

"TJ prepared well," Harsin said. "He cares. He knows what he's doing out there. He did some good things as far as checking us out of some bad plays, so he made some good decisions that way. Again, he's a young player."