'We've had this one circled': Auburn players ready for Penn State rematch
AUBURN- It’s been a year since Auburn lost at Penn State and nobody inside the athletic complex has forgotten.
In Bryan Harsin’s first road game as Auburn head coach, the Tigers briefly led 10-7, ultimately falling short, 28-20. The loss was in front of over 100,000 Penn State fans dressed in white. Auburn had a chance at the end of the game, but a Bo Nix fade pass attempt to Kobe Hudson fell incomplete on fourth down.
“We think we should have won the football game, for sure,” John Samuel Shenker said. “That’s left a sour taste in our mouth for a year now, so we’ve had this one circled for a while- the guys that were here last year seeing what happened and what we can do better to win this game this year when they come to our house.”
With Penn State holding the 2-1 overall record in the series, the Tigers are preparing differently this week than they have for the past two weekends. Mercer and San Jose State aside, this game sets the precedence for the rest of the season.
“We know this week- competition is only going to get harder from here on out. We have to be consistent with that approach and take it one week at a time,” Derick Hall said. “I think the guys are ready. We’re prepared. We’re fired up… I believe if we win this game, it will be a big confidence boost for us heading into the second half of the season.”
Penn State is Auburn’s first ranked opponent of the season. The Tigers have to clean things up on both sides of the ball in order to be prepared. Linebacker Owen Pappoe was quick to name multiple improvements needed on the defensive side to provide more pressure on the ball.
“I think we need to do a better job at getting up on the field on third down,” Pappoe said. “There were a lot of holes in our coverage, guys hitting us on slants. We have a plan for that this week to help fix things up… Of course we take pride in stopping the run too, so that’s going to be big for us.”
In Monday’s press conference, it was clear that these leaders are not taking their job lightly this week. Both Hall and Pappoe said that they had come from the film room. Hall said that he had sent a message out to Auburn’s edges about “starting film early.”
“I came from watching them just now,” Pappoe said. “They run a lot of the same stuff, but obviously there are some tweaks here and there. It’s a complicated league. They’re going to take some of the things that we’ve been struggling with these past two weeks and try to throw it at us with their own twist to it, but they’ve run a lot of similar things that they did last year.”
