Offense strikes back

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AUBURN, Ala. | After getting "whipped" in the first scrimmage, it should come as no surprise that Auburn's offense struck back in Saturday's second scrimmage of fall drills.

The first-team offense had several big moments in the 100-play scrimmage including long passes to running back Peyton Barber and wide receiver Ricardo Louis along with a long run by Jovon Robinson.

Gus Malzahn wanted to give plenty of opportunities to quarterback Jeremy Johnson so the scrimmage leaned heavily, approximately 70 percent, toward the passing game.

"Our emphasis was throwing the ball today and letting Jeremy have more throwing the football," Malzahn said. "It was good to see some big plays out of the offense, but at the same time there was also some big plays the defense did today."

Of course, having defensive end Carl Lawson watching the scrimmage from the sidelines was probably a big boost to the offense. Lawson was a terror in last week's first foray into Jordan-Hare Stadium.

Malzahn's said Saturday's scrimmage was focused more on players battling for a spot on the two-deep.

"That was part of our plan going in," he said. "We talked about challenging some of those young guys, and some of the veteran guys have not gotten to where they wanted to get."

Auburn didn't provide stats for the scrimmage but Malzahn said Johnson had a good day.

"He threw the ball 20-plus times. We wanted to give him some reps out there, and he performed well."

Roc Thomas had a catch out of the backfield early in the scrimmage. Robinson got the bulk of the carries but Barber took advantage of his opportunities with the long catch and a run of over 20 yards.

"It was pretty much just a wheel route," Barber said of the approximate 65-yard catch and run. "I caught it and took it about another 30 yards before I was tackled."

Wide receiver D'haquille Williams left the scrimmage about halfway through with a minor ankle injury according to a team spokesman.

Defensively, Montravius Adams said he had a sack.

MORE FROM MALZAHN

His opening statement...

"OK, we had a good one today, probably had close to 100 plays as far as the practice was concerned. We started out with special teams situations and then we had all live up front special team, we were thud on the ball carriers in all phases. We're still trying to figure out, especially the young guys, of who could help us on special teams, so that was a big emphasis. We also had a couple 2-minute situations with the 1s against the 1s, 2s against the 2s and let our guys with officials get out there. I thought that was good. Then we put the ball down and had a scrimmage, and we worked primarily with two groups. The coaches rotated guys in and out. The emphasis was a little more throwing than it was before. I think we were close to 65-70 percent pass in today's scrimmage."

On if the offense or defense won...

"I think it was more close today. I think there was some good things on defense, and I think the offense came out and executed and performed better."

On the running backs...

"Peyton got a few carries today. Jovon probably got the majority of it. Roc got a few. We feel good about our evaluation in the first two weeks of fall camp as far as where our running backs are at."

On the competition at punter...

"They're competing and that's good. They're both talented. They're both capable of being very successful at this level. That's the good thing. They're competing every day. We're trying to put them in situations so they can feel that pressure. Today we did that. We let them punt when there is live up front and thought that was good. That is always the best ways to evaluate guys."

On backup quarterback Sean White...

"He's had some good practices. You've got to understand, our level is high for Sean. He's been in our system for year, our No. 3 guy. He got a lot of reps during the spring. I feel good about where he's at. He needs to keep improving. If he goes into the game, we expect him to play at a high level."

 

On freshman cornerback Jamel Dean...

 

"He's a guy that we planned on him getting here, and he got here the first day of fall camp. He seems like a very pleasant young man. He's very talented. He's a good addition to our team."

On the video board...

"It was really good for us today. We actually had the highlight reels and stuff like that, and it was good. Our guys are getting used to it. It's big. It is a factor. We'll be over here again, take it the next step, with some field cameras, turn the music on, the sound system on. It's a good thing."

 

On practice over the next two weeks...

"This upcoming week we'll still work on us. Good on good. Somewhere down the line we'll transition into Louisville. That'll be a balance this coming week, and obviously when it gets closer in the two weeks previous, that's when you'll really see more of a focus on the first game."