AUBURN | Keionte Scott had to battle 11 defenders on punt returns against Missouri. He also had to fight a significant obstacle in the sky: the sun.

With the game kicking off at 11 a.m. and no clouds in the sky, following a punt became difficult for the sophomore, especially in the second half.

“Once the field switched, it was my first time having to deal with the sun,” Scott said. “I feel like it got the best of me at some times, but also just in my brain, I was thinking, like, ‘I can’t see the ball.’”

Losing the ball helped Mizzou pin the Tigers in bad field position as Jack Stonehouse bombed two punts of 60-plus yards, hitting them high to make Scott’s job even more difficult than usual. While battling the sun, the transfer from Snow College had one thing on his mind: field position.

“Where the field was, where the field was going to be after the ball, because I couldn’t see it, and I was trying to get my hand up,” Scott said. “But the punter did a really good job of hanging it high, so when I was trying to find it, I still had to, like, pick my head up because the sun was still just coming through.”

Talking to Coach Cadillac Williams, Scott was advised to get away from the ball if he couldn’t follow it, not to cause a turnover and give Mizzou excellent field position in a game where both offenses struggle. After the game, the San Diego native texted Roc Bellantoni, Auburn’s special teams coach, and told him that he would be more prepared for the sun, which prompted the question: can you really prepare for the sun?

While Scott didn’t answer directly, he was adamant that he wasn’t expecting the giant orb in the sky to be such a factor on punts, stating that Missouri’s punt returner had trouble as well.

As Bryan Harsin pointed out, this Saturday’s game against LSU is almost mostly at night, so the sun won’t be a problem. The Auburn coach knows that Scott is capable of breaking a big one when he gets the chance.

“He’s one of those guys that can go,” Harsin said. “I think we all see that … He can make guys miss, he can do a lot of really good things. We’ve got to help him; get the other 10 guys on punt return to help him out there.”