Aaron Murray shared some interesting thoughts on Auburn’s offense as the Tigers come down the stretch of the regular season.

During Hugh Freeze’s first season at the helm, Auburn (5-4) is on the cusp of bowl eligibility this weekend when they face host Arkansas (3-6).

Auburn has won back-to-back games after previously beginning 0-4 in SEC play. A large factor for that has been the shift to make Payton Thorne the sole quarterback. Thorne was previously splitting some reps with Robby Ashford before the winning streak.

Yet, the ESPN analyst still sees room for improvement from Auburn’s offense. Murray explained during a recent appearance on McElroy And Cubelic In The Morning that starting downs strong is key.

“They want to go uptempo. They want to go fast. They had some success on first and second downs to start the game but all of sudden second, third, and fourth quarter you have a couple drops. You can’t get into that tempo,” Murray said. “Kind of get stuck behind the chains. This is not an offense that wants to be in second and third and long situations. If they can’t have success on first down, you’re going to struggle a little bit.”

Murray added that the continued developed of the wide receivers will be important.

“I think they’re trying to work in some of their receivers that they feel are healthy right now like Johnson,” Murray said. “Get those guys to be a little more consistent catching the football.”

Meanwhile, as Freeze has elevated Holden Geriner to the primary backup spot at quarterback, it signals to Murray that Ashford could elect to hit the transfer portal.

“I think it was telling that we didn’t see Robby the entire football game. There was not a single snap to him….I think there’s some things going on behind the scenes. I think there’s some frustration probably from Robby,” Murray said. “He’s a competitor…If he wants to play QB1 somewhere he’s just going to have to transfer out and go to a smaller division or different conference in order to do that.”

Auburn at Arkansas is set for 4 p.m. EST on the SEC Network.