In a performance few could have seen coming, Auburn’s much-hyped defensive front was dominated by Mississippi State’s struggling offensive front on Saturday night in Starkville. Bulldog quarterback Nick Fitzgerald alone rushed for 195 yards on the Tigers’ defense and the MSU team racked up 349 rushing yards on the game.

Mississippi State would go on to win the game 23-9, once again giving Auburn a losing SEC record for the season. The Tigers are now 1-2 in conference play and 4-2 overall on the season.

During his weekly Sunday press availability, it didn’t take Kevin Steele long to sum up his unit’s performance from the weekend.

“Really can only be summed up by — unacceptable. We were not effective in doing our job, and that starts with me,” Steele said.

Mississippi State’s rushing performance was aided by the fact Auburn’s offense couldn’t consistently stay on the field, the Tigers had only 90 rushing yards for the game and went three of 14 on third downs for the night. At one point in the game, stretching from the second quarter thru halftime and into the third quarter, Auburn’s offense had not touched the ball for over one hour of real time.

Steele wasn’t making any excuses for his unit’s performance, however, and noted that his unit had a series of “misunderstandings” based on the motion and adjustments made by Mississippi State’s offense during before the snap.

“They basically changed some things around, in terms of how they approached their final formations before the ball was snapped,” Steele said. “We had a few misunderstandings. It wasn’t bust, anything like that, it was just in terms of gap fits, inside, outside, the widths of it… They allowed the reloading of that empty back, back into the backfield. They just — we didn’t fit things cleanly. The missed tackles weren’t good at all, uncharacteristic of us but we’ll get it corrected.”

Auburn’s defensive coordinator would have been remiss to not mention a few positives from the game, starting with the gutty performance of his middle linebacker Deshaun Davis. Davis was injured during the game in what appeared to be a serious incident. He was forced to leave the field but surprisingly made a return after being examined by the Auburn training staff.

“Well, he’s a tough guy, a leader. It says a lot,” Steele continued. “His character, his work ethic, his toughness, his leadership. It speaks to all of those things because obviously, when you are injured like that, they aren’t going to let him go back if the doctors don’t clear him but it also becomes to I can or I can’t — and he was pretty adamant that he could.”

In addition to Davis, defensive back Jeremiah Dinson also had a solid showing on Saturday. The free safety led the team with 15 tackles and had an interception in the game.

“I don’t think any of us had a good game — none of us, me included, but he was effective,” the defensive coordinator added. “He did not have any gapped out mistakes. He had the interception on the second third down, he is a smart guy.”

Finally, Steele gave his thoughts on Tennessee coach Jeremy Pruitt and the what he’s seen from the Volunteers after his initial viewing of Tennessee film.

“Jeremy is a very very smart football coach, a very smart football coach. He’s a tough guy that is relentless,” Steele said. “They are well coached, obviously, they are still in the process of putting their mark on the team but they are well coached.”

A 2-3 Tennessee team travels to Auburn this Saturday for an 11 a.m. kickoff after coming off a bye week.