Rapid Reaction: Auburn hangs on for bizarre and controversial win over Arkansas
It was windy. It was wet. It far from pretty, but Auburn did what it had to do to return to the winning column.
Behind the best rushing performance the Tigers have had against an SEC opponent in nearly a year, Auburn and Tank Bigsby escaped with a last-second, bounce-back 30-28 victory over visiting Arkansas on Saturday.
Auburn rushed for 259 yards as a team, led by Bigsby’s 146 yards on 20 carries. Entering Week 3, Gus Malzahn and Chad Morris’ offense had failed to rush for over 100 yards in a single game.
Perhaps rushing out of pure necessity due to the less-than-ideal weather conditions, Auburn jumped out to an early 7-0 lead thanks to a blocked punt in Arkansas’ own end zone.
0⃣ to 💯 real quickpic.twitter.com/JSidfFbOq5
— Auburn Football (@AuburnFootball) October 10, 2020
The block allowed for patience from the Auburn offense with its run game as the team eclipsed its rushing total against Georgia (39 yards) in less than 2 drives against the Razorbacks. The Tigers carried the ball on 17 of their final 20 plays of the first half.
Despite Auburn’s dominance rushing the ball, Feleipe Franks and running back Trelon Smith kept Sam Pittman’s Razorbacks within striking distance. Smith made his first career start with Arkansas running back Rakeem Boyd not making the trip due to injury.
Franks threw for 302 yards and 4 touchdown passes leading the Hogs back from a 17-point hole to a 20-18 deficit but missed passes on two Arkansas 2-point conversion attempts. The Hogs missed the extra point kick on their first touchdown.
Auburn and Bo Nix opened things up a little more in the second half with more passing plays, as Nix continued to target wide receiver Anthony Schwartz more than any other wideout this season, but was ultimately held to little success as the sophomore QB continued to face pressure.
Nix put together his best series as a passer in a drive that ended with a touchdown to open the 4th quarter. He completed all 7 of his throws for 72 yards, including 5 by way of Schwartz who capped off the drive with a 17-yard score to push Auburn back to a 2-score lead.
The Razorbacks stormed back to take the lead late in the 4th with an 11-play, 70-yard drive that ended with a 30-yd touchdown from Franks to De’Vion Warren, giving Arkansas a slim 28-27 lead with over 5 minutes remaining.
Nix found Seth Williams for a 32-yard gain to set up what should have been an easy 34-yard field goal for Anders Carlson, but the junior kicker pushed the kick right.
After forcing Arkansas to a quick 3-and-out, the Tigers had one final drive to set up the potential game-winner, and relied heavily on Bigsby to set them up. A controversial intentional-grounding call forced a 39-yard kick by Carlson to sneak in and win the game.
This is 100% a fumble
Bo Nix spikes the ball backwards, behind him, whatever. It’s a backwards pass. pic.twitter.com/hoTOdVFTcz— i Reporter Liam 🦖 (@Blutman27) October 10, 2020
Refs should be held accountable. They had forever to get that right and botched it. I don’t complain about refs much.. But that directly changed the outcome. Absolutely deplorable.
Arkansas won that. Everybody saw the SEC home office bail Auburn out. Auburn knows, Arkansas won that game
Agreed, absolutely was an Arky win. Hogs got hosed.
Don’t have a dog in the fight, and I agree that this was an inexcusable call by the SEC.
Yeah it wasn’t an iffy call it was cut and dry. The tape showed him clearly turn and throw the ball behind his feet. If that’s not the definition of a backwards pass then I don’t know what is.
I don’t think anyway is arguing that it wasn’t a fumble. The whistle was blown and that’s why the call stood. Tough call.
Your just mad cause you were the team to end arkansas 3 year SEC losing streak.
30-28
You know that was a loss.
Enjoy Malzahn and Morris.
Lol you proud of that win? You shouldn’t be. I don’t even have a dog in the fight and I know that.
And you soiled your pants!
You really shouldn’t be proud of 30-28.
Whistle was blown after spike so the play was dead. Tough loss in a hard fought game.
Your argument is the refs were so wrong they couldn’t fix how wrong they were. We are 2-1.
Keep telling yourself that lol
LOL
Honestly you can keep it. Have fun with Chud running your program straight to the trash.
Thought Chad had a good game tonight. He definitely wasn’t the problem for auburn tonight.
I refuse to believe Chad Morris is capable of calling a winning game post-2018.
That was all Gus…so the usual.
So the UK was all Gus too? lol
Im an auburn fan but was have been born and raised in fayetteville arkansas. I go to all the arkansas home games. It breaks my heart to see the auburn program trashed by chad morris. Ive seen the damage he can do first hand.
Watch the replay. The whistle absolutely wasnt blown right after the spike, the whistle is blown while players from both teams are wrestling for the ball….watch and listen
With no clear recovery
I hope Arky will file a protest with the SEC office, that last call by the refs was a killer and wrong completely.
Can post gifs or pics but google ‘South Park Cable Company’ and that will be the SEC’s response to the complaint.
can’t*
agree 100%
The sad thing for the Hogs is that once that clock reaches 00:00 the game is counted. It can be questioned but that undeserved “W” still goes on the record.
Call this the “Curse of Barry Odom.” It will be the first of many inexplicable things that happen to the hogs that will keep them from winning games they should. If Barry was coach of Mizzou today we lose to LSU>
This has been happening to us for far too long to blame it on Barry.
Weve been experiencing stuff like this long before odom came. This wasnt even the worst experience weve had with SEC refs. All arkansas fans know about the “florida game” and how refs cheated for tebow.
2002 vs Florida and 2009 vs Florida. While I’m at it, 2010 vs Auburn.
Auburn got the win but it was very sloppy.. The weather conditions were terrible as well..
You cant spike a fumble. These refs are freaking jokes.
Cry
This barely win to a no name non ranked team will cost you your overrated ranking. Hopefully push you out of the top 20 down where you belong. Bad calls won’t save you forever.
You’re probably wrong about Auburn dropping. If anything it gives argument to move Arkansas up. Auburn will just have to fight with Tenn for placement which may go in Auburns favor. Tenn had a game and put 21 up on UGA but couldn’t hold em to, UGA putting up 44. Say what you will but statistically, Auburn held UGA to less and put up more on offense, just not on the board
WDE0012 kid you need a hobby cause your not a good troll.
And you need a new insult and grammar lessons.
Man, Arky should have won that. Crazy how much better the Hogs look this season.
The difference coaching makes
That was a fumble
Bigsby is very very good. Auburn was fortunate.
Bigsby is a monster!
I would argue Bigsby just carried Auburn through that game with his athleticism. I mean, what he did tonight makes me seriously question why the run game wasn’t designed around in in the UGA game. Dude is a play-making factory in overdrive
Too many mishaps on the special teams. Tackling went sloppy. Hogs gave that one away.
Arkansas got robbed. Wow. That was bad.
As a Missouri fan, I was pulling hard for Arkansas to pull another upset on what’s been a crazy Saturday. Feel like they got robbed on that backward spike/fumble. Arkansas should be happy with the job Sam Pittman is doing; he’s the right man for the job. I’m pretty nervous about our game against Arky, gonna be tough!
I went to an Auburn message board and a majority felt that we got screwed.
Y’all did get screwed. That was mismanagement from SEC refs all day
Anyone with a pair of eyes that viewed the game will say the same thing…Arky got really hosed.
Congrats Auburn. For all eternity Tigers will go down as the winners. No sense in claiming anything different. Poor tackling, special teams errors, and questionable extra point strategy left it in refs’ hands. That’s no recipe for victory on the road in the SEC. Time now to try to figure out a way to slow Ole Miss’s potent attack.
s
I Went to auburn massage board and they were happy.
I’ll take your word, as I’m sure it’s correct! Lol
yea proper massages usually leave one kinda happy for sure
It’s probably the last win we get this year. We are too banged up.
I wouldn’t go that far. We had Britt, Bryant, Simpson, Shivers, and Stove out. I’d like to think that played a significant factor.
However, to Arkansas credit, they are a Top 25 team already after the 3 games if you ask me. Incredible improvement and I believe they will pull off some upsets that finish them ranked this season.
All I can figure is they blew the play dead before there was a “clear and immediate recovery.” Otherwise, I have no idea how the refs determined it wasn’t a fumble. It’ll go down as a win for us and I’ll take it, but man, that’s definitely not the way you want to win.
Well said. Congrats on a gutsy win. I’ve been saying it that Arky played us well because they’re a good team. It certainly was an entertaining game to watch.
…unless you’re an Arkansas fan.
After they got over the hump and got that win last week I realized this is a new day for Arkansas football. They’re no longer the guaranteed win for any of us they’ve been the past couple of years. Pittman was definitely the right guy at the right time for them.
Arkansas got hosed, somebody should lose their job for that one, hopefully Karma pays off.
karma will come around when UGA pulls their annual choke job whether its USC Bama or UF game 1980 was soooo long ago wasn’t it?
I’m glad you got your first of many this season out of the way. Georgia pending.
It’s always sad to see an old rival resort to rooting for other teams in a lopsided “rivalry” just so the can watch a competitive game against their hated foe who no longer thinks of them.
I think that Georgia, Kentucky, and Arkansas prove Auburn is overrated and not a top 20 team.
I just want all the auburn fans to know that are saying cry and all this other bs the ones that are being honest your cool with me but the others your so proud and cocky you was a 13.5 point favorite and it took every min of the games and giving the ref a $20 for you to beat a team with a new head coach less “talent” and ranked last in the sec last year (almost last in fbs)
Yeah that Alabama cockiness is spilling over to Auburn. Yall Auburn fans starting to sound a lot like Alabama fans, making excuses and enabling bad calls for the win. Loss of honor.
It sure would be nice if Anonymous Hacker Group released SEC emails to Wikileaks on their ‘formula’ for choosing this year’s schedule.
Would also be interesting to see behind the scenes conversations with ref crews.
Coozie I would worry more about your team. Last time I checked, they were down 21 to 2 to Kentucky.
If the refs wore mics that were turned on all the time…hmmm.
The refs screwed Arkansas. It was a backward pass, which is technically a lateral, therefore anyone’s ball.
I was pulling for Feleipe and Arkansas to get the win. The refs apparently made a determination that Nix was spiking the ball to conserve time. The problem is, it was not a forward pass. The rule for a forward pass is:
Illegal Forward Pass
ARTICLE 2. A forward pass is illegal if:
f. The passer to conserve time throws the ball directly to the ground (1) after the ball has already touched the ground;
The rules address throwing the ball directly into the ground to conserve time. The rules do not make any distinction as to whether the quarterback throws the ball directly into the ground in front of, to the side of, or behind his body.
Hey Auburn fans…you won and paid for a natty 10 years ago. Nobody cares anymore. Since then your like 70 and 40. 1988-89 is the last back to back 10 win seasons. Auburn is not a big time football program. They can’t win big games away from Jordan Hare and your coach is a offensive genius….lol. You should have lost to Arkansas but the refs saved you. You are going 6-4 this year and Bo Nix is a joke…if his last name was Smith nobody would give him the time of day. Thank God I’m not an Auburn fan….GO DAWGS!!!!!!!!!!
Worst excuse to cover up the terrible call in the history of excuses. Very obvious the Hogs were recovering, but enjoy that win Auburn.
everyone on here is making a big deal about the spumble, or maybe the fike?
The really bad call was the pass Interference that got Auburn up there to begin with.
I’ve watched a lot of college football game sin my life & this is the absolute first time I have witnessed anything as bizarre as this. the refs blew the play dead ? There must be some reason ? No not really…just a ref’s wrong reaction to a really-bizarre play.
Oops a mistype…”in”.
Auburn 2 and 1. Ark 1 and 2.
Technically…Auburn “won” the game, Arkansas “lost”…everyone who loves SEC football knows what happened at the end of the game….all I will say is, I want Auburn to ENJOY Chad Morris as I see he is doing for Auburn what he did for Arkansas!
I understand that Arkansas fans are upset. It should have been called a fumble. However, they blew the whistle as soon as he spiked it so AU didn’t really even go after the ball. NO WAY they can change that call and just give the ball to Arkansas.
Had some recovered it before the aisle then fine.
“Had someone recovered it before the whistle then fine.” Apparently no edit on here and spell check sucks