Vasha Hunt | Opelika-Auburn News

A lack of progress prompted Tommy Tuberville to fire Tony Franklin six games into the season, hand the offense to a trio of longtime assistants and hope for the best.

So what’s to come now, after Saturday’s major, and certainly unexpected, step backward?

“We are not playing very well right now. We are not coaching very well,” Tuberville said. “Things keep snowballing on us.”

The latest snowball to smack No. 20 Auburn (4-3, 2-3 SEC) in the face came in the form of Saturday night’s 25-22 loss to Arkansas (3-3, 1-2 SEC), who came to Jordan-Hare Stadium without a win in the SEC and with the worst defense in the conference. 

“I never would have imagined this would happen,” kick returner Tristan Davis said.

Auburn’s faint hopes of imagining itself in Atlanta for the SEC Championship that it brought into Saturday all but vanished because the offense didn’t show up and the usually-reliable defense was subsequently left on the field too long.

“We’re just not producing right now on the field,” wide receiver Rod Smith said. “We just need to get better.”

The results, of course, didn’t get better just three days after Tuberville abruptly fired Franklin.

Auburn’s offense totaled its lowest output of the season with 193 yards, not cracking triple digits until Kodi Burns’ 33-yard pass to Tommy Trott with 12:19 left in the fourth quarter. In scoring just 3 more points than it was picked by odds-makers to win by, the Tigers gained only 21 yards on its three offensive scoring drives.

Twenty-four of those (wait, it makes sense) came on Auburn’s opening drive in the second half, which was set up by an Arkansas fumble on the kickoff and capped by a 3-yard Burns run. The two previous, which both ended with Wes Byrum field goals, netted minus-3 yards.

The lone highlight-worthy play from the Tigers came on special teams, when Tristan Davis returned a first-quarter kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown.

Yet the Tigers, who were outgained by 223 and out-possessed 35:02 to 24:58, were just 5 yards and four downs away from escaping with a victory.

After Michael Smith’s 63-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter gave Arkansas its first lead since 3-0, Burns led Auburn, down 25-20, from its own 20 to the Arkansas 5 with less than three minutes to go.

From there, Auburn gained just 1 more yard on Burns’ first-down sneak. His next three passes all sailed over his intended receivers’ heads.

“I know that I’m a big-time player, so I’m going to make those plays. But I just got to finish them,” said Burns, who got his second start of the year. “We didn’t finish and that’s what I’ve got to do and that’s what we have to do as a team.”

The Tigers had one more last-ditch chance with 1:03 left after Arkansas took an intentional safety. But Burns’ second interception of the day — snagged by the Hogs’ Matt Harris in the middle of the field with no blue jerseys in sight — ended the Tigers’ hopes after two plays.

“We’re definitely a team that’s facing adversity right now,” Smith said. “But that’s not an excuse.”

As promised, the Tigers ran primarily from the spread Saturday, which has been the case all season except for the first quarter at Vanderbilt last Saturday. Since gaining 126 yards in that 13-point opening quarter, Auburn has amassed just 275 yards in the seven quarters thereafter.

“I thought we did pretty good with the play-calling,” Smith said. “We definitely had a lot more chances. We went deep a lot more than we did.”

The only problem was that those balls mostly sailed wide or over his and Auburn’s other receivers’ heads. Aside from his drive in the fourth, Burns missed on a number of opportunities to pick up his first passing touchdown of the season. Chris Todd, who was used sparingly, was 3-for-10 for 18 yards and an interception.

“When they do what they did to us on defense tonight, you have to have somebody to throw it downfield and be able to catch it,” Tuberville said of the Hogs, who came into the game allowing 208.4 rushing yards per game, but surrendered just 56 to the Tigers.

“Even as bad as we played and coached in terms of offense, we did have a chance right there at the end,” Tuberville said. “That’s how the game went all night.”

And that’s how it’s gone all season, with, and now without, Franklin calling the plays.

“The worst thing we could possibly do right now is panic,” Trott said. “We’ve got a good team, we’ve just got to perform.”

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