Auburn coach Alex Golesh said his team must quickly move past Saturday’s loss and tighten the details that have led to mistakes on all three phases of the game as it prepares for another difficult SEC road test at Ole Miss.
During Monday’s press conference, Golesh discussed the Tigers’ struggles against tempo and explosive plays, the need for more consistency on offense, injury updates, and the challenge of facing an Ole Miss team led by one of the nation’s most dynamic quarterbacks and a veteran defense.
Here’s everything the first-year coach said on Monday.
Alex Golesh, Head coach
Opening statement on Auburn’s loss Saturday and preparing for Ole Miss…
Golesh: Awesome, appreciate everybody being here. Recap Saturday. First of all, what an incredible crowd, especially for an 11 o’clock game. Grateful to our fans, our students, everybody, the band. Certainly created a home-field advantage in the first half that we will, as we build, take advantage of. We certainly did. I thought the way that the game flowed, as tough as it was early on in that game, when you look at the big picture, you have an opportunity. You hold them to three off a short field. Offensively, to be able to go down and score rather than three, be able to punch it in and score seven, I think it plays out a little bit differently as it goes. And then you go to the second quarter and really give up 21, score seven. You go into halftime and feel like you’re playing from behind the whole time, because you are. I thought in the second half, defensively, we played football to where we gave our offense a chance, and offensively, we didn’t score, which obviously, you’re playing from behind, but that was the toughest piece of it. And there’s so much that goes into it. There’s so much to clean up, so much to learn from. Ultimately, we’ve got to play much better offensively. I mentioned it after the game, but seven drives that were four plays or less, obviously not going to get it done. We had eight third downs that were over 12 yards. That’s a tough way to live, and still close to 50% on third down with what that looked like. Defensively, not good enough on third down. The quarterback scrambles killed us and killed us in a big way. The explosive plays killed us. We didn’t tackle great. And those are all the margins that you talk about. So really on both sides of the ball, we had three penalties on special teams, which we had not. Obviously, the two kicks out of bounds are killer in terms of field position. And then we had the very first play on the kickoff return, which sets the offense back. And that has not been us. Tough a little bit to find positives, but it’s the way that we start off and getting in a hole, which we can’t. For us to go win that game, and really for us to go win any game in this league, the margins are so tight. And you’ve heard me say that a million times. The margins are so tight. You don’t have to play perfect, but you’ve got to play really sound. And that’s fundamentally, that’s situational football. And if you go down, the ability to respond right away. In the same breath, if you get up, the ability to sustain. And we lacked detail as a whole on Saturday. If you summarize it, there’s a bunch of detail that we lacked on all three sides of the ball. And so there are positives, and we coached off of the positives. But you continue to be really real with our guys and point out the margins that are as tight as they get. Huge for us to be able to turn the page. Huge for us to be able to move on. And that’s this league. Every week is a challenge, and it’s why you come here. It’s to play the best of the best. And we flip the page and play another really good team on the road. Our ability to go handle the travel, our ability to go handle the road environment, both really, really big. Playing against a really good football team, a really well-coached football team, and in a big way, a football team that knows how to win. Offensively, the quarterback is as special a player as there is. You kind of watch it from afar, and then you turn the film on. That is a dynamic, special, special football player. He creates in every way. Creates with his feet. The arm strength is real. The accuracy is real. The ability to extend plays and push the ball down the field is real. The skill positions are really, really good. Running back is one of the best in the country. They do a good job up front, do a good job schematically. Use tempo. For our defense, this will be the second week in a row similar offensively in terms of tempo, similar offensively in terms of really good quarterbacks. And it’ll be a big challenge for us. Offensively, this defense is a veteran group. That’s the thing that stands out, is it’s all seniors and juniors, guys that have played a ton of football, guys that have been in that system. And although a new coordinator, a lot of similarities and a lot of physicality as you look at the lines of scrimmage. That for us is going to be the biggest challenge. We’ve got to do a really, really good job of establishing the run game, as we always do. We’ve got to do a really good job of not turning the football over, creating turnovers and allowing ourselves to have extra possessions. I think it’ll be a really, really big challenge for us. I think it’s the next step for us in our growth to be able to get rid of whatever happened on Saturday, wipe it clean, reset and go. I told our guys this morning, we’ve had the ability to reset as this year’s gone. We’ve had to lick our wounds, come back and play good football. And that’s the challenge to us. I told them, if we don’t, it’ll be a really long week. If we do, we’ve got an opportunity to go on the road and beat a really good football team, which is what’s expected of us.
On Tai Buster’s return to practice and a birthday gift for Auburn’s sports information director…
Golesh: Yeah, I’ll start with Taylor’s birthday. Actually, just found out that Taylor, who was the first person to reach out to you this morning? And as with most sports information directors, I got him a Starbucks gift card so he can keep rolling. So grateful for Taylor and how hard he works at this. And I mean that. So I appreciate you giving him a layup there. Tai Buster. So two totally different topics here. Tai has worked his tail off. I give Tai a lot of credit. He’s working through a return to play. The hope is here in the next couple of weeks, we get him fully integrated in practice and he gives us a chance to see where he is. He’s been engaged. I give him a lot of credit. Again, been engaged. He’s itching to get back out there. I thought when he got banged up, he was competing at a high level. So we’re excited to get him back here soon.
On the defense’s struggles against the quick passing game Saturday…
Golesh: Yeah, I think a combination of a lot of things. I think from an alignment standpoint, getting set, adjusting to the tempo, I thought we did a fairly good job. Getting the ball out quick, they did a good job of getting playmakers the ball. We did a good job in coverage at times. There’s a combination of a lot. There were some incredible throws. There were a couple of back-shoulder balls that were thrown that, in terms of timing, ball placement, got a guy in the spot. And literally, guy for guy, went up and made a play. That’s hard to defend, hard to execute. They did a really good job there. Thought the tight end was a big, big difference-maker for them. That matchup was tough. The biggest thing, I think, going in was the ability to, knowing that there were going to be checkdowns, flat balls or balls in the flat thrown, the ability to get those and create essentially second-and-sevens, second-and-sixes. There were a handful that we did a good job on. There were a handful where they became eights and nines. And then getting you to third-and-short, and now you’re second-and-short. And now you get your full menu of plays. I would tell you a combination. I think we did a good job getting aligned. I thought there weren’t just busts everywhere by any means. But there’s the ability to get those things down and make them snap it again, which I thought in the second half we did a really good job. I thought in the first half, it was about as average as it was on the extended drives. And just as much that as the situational football piece of it, the ability to get off on fourth down. And again, we weren’t there. But we didn’t tackle as well as we did the week before. And that’s a part of it. So there’s a combination of a lot of things there. But in terms of your first question of alignment, assignment, I thought we were sound.
On the offensive line’s struggles after playing well against Georgia the previous week…
Golesh: Yeah, Justin, I think collectively, we didn’t get the run game going. There’s several factors. One, I think matchup-wise, the edges. And I said it all week. Hopefully, you guys have figured out I’ll be as real with you as anybody. And it’s no secret. You look at those edges, real. Run game, pass game. And for us, it was going to have to be finding ways to neutralize that. Running the football, like these two-, three-, four-yard gains, you have to be able to create four-, five-, six-yard gains to stay ahead of the sticks. And when you don’t and they get minimized, now you’re second-and-eight, which then turns into, like, you want to run it again? Get to third-and-six? Or are you going to throw it? And now, if you’re efficient, great. And we had three drives where we were efficient in those situations. And so then you’re trying to throw it to be efficient to get to second down, and we didn’t protect well. And that’s really on everybody. It’s the ability to get open. It’s the ability to schematically do a good job of chipping and nudging and doing some things to neutralize those edges. So it’s a long-winded answer to your question. We didn’t play well up front. And the challenge for us is to continue to grow there. And we’ve got to find ways to play better there. We’ve got to find ways to creatively run the football. And that’s involving everybody. And if you watch us, that’s where we’re trying to get. Part of that is not getting down to where you can feel like you can effectively still run it. But it certainly wasn’t good enough. You take the sacks out, and you’re right around four yards. But the sacks add up. And so now you’re as minimized as it looks. It was as bad as it looked, I should say, in terms of being able to run it.
On Jacob Strand’s status and the value of Cope getting playing time…
Golesh: Yeah, Jacob will be fine. As we go here, I thought it was good. Cope got, I want to say, 16 to 18 reps in there. And we’ve tried to get Cope, bring him along. It was really good for him to get some real reps to see where he’s at. That position, you’ve got to go and earn it in practice. But when you get out there and the lights are on, there’s nothing like those reps. So he’s competitive. He’s continuing to grow and develop. And we need him to grow up here really quickly.
On using tight ends and running backs in the passing game to help the offense move the ball…
Golesh: Yeah, it’s certainly part of what we do. You saw the second drive of the game. That’s where it got going. We’ve continued to try to get everybody involved that we feel like can help us move the chains. Everything’s on the table every week. We sit down, and from Sunday to Monday, you’re looking at matchups. You’re looking at formational advantages. And sometimes that is the tight end. Sometimes it is the back. Sometimes it’s a combination. Sometimes you feel like you’ve got a matchup advantage on the outside. Sometimes you move people around. For us, it’s always been about players, formations, plays. That’s where it may be a little bit misconstrued of, well, the system is to get your playmakers the ball in space. And the tight ends have done a good job. And we’ve got to continue to figure out ways that those guys can be the matchup that we like. The running backs have done a good job catching the football. And it’s a combination of all of it. For us, continuing to be creative, continuing to create formational advantages, player advantages. And every week, that’s different. It really is. And so that’s where I just walked out of. We’re working through finalizing a normal-down plan where you can continue to stay ahead of the sticks. The run game is a part of that as well.
