There were plenty of positive takeaways from Auburn football's 43-8 win over Southern Miss on Saturday. However, several aspects of the game set off an internal alarm inside head coach Alex Golesh.
Auburn dominated the game offensively by out-gaining Southern Miss, 613-221, and the Tigers' defense limited the Golden Eagles to 50 rushing yards and just one red zone trip. However, Auburn committed seven penalties for 55 yards. Four of Auburn's plays were nullified, including a holding call that wiped off a 52-yard touchdown run by Byrum Brown early in the 1st quarter.
Golesh said postgame that he is happy his team got the win, but wants to continue his complete overhaul of the program's mindset by not settling for just winning the game.
“I was just
so beyond disappointed in the sloppiness," Golesh said postgame. "I was beyond disappointed in the block in the back on the punt return and then the fumble in the red zone, like just sloppy, sloppy, and I don’t care what the score is, I don’t. That’s what I just told these guys. A win's a win, and winning college football games is hard, but if the standard is that, and that’s what it looks like, then we’re gonna have a really, really, really long season."
Golesh sent a similar message to his team following Auburn's 17-16 win over Baylor in Week 1, but also took the blame for the sloppy play. He hopes to get those issues corrected before next Saturday's SEC opener with the Florida Gators, but hopes that his team is just as motivated as he is to work out the issues this week in practice.
"We’ll take the win, again, grateful to our fans, but there's so many points offensively left out there it makes me sick," Golesh said. "And we’ll get it right, we’ll get it cleaned up. There just needs to be a sense of urgency to clean it up."
The Tigers moved to 2-0 with their 43-9 win over Southern Miss, and will open SEC play next Saturday against Florida at Jordan-Hare Stadium. The Gators are also 2-0 under first-year head coach Jon Sumrall, and hope to push its winning streak over Auburn to two games.
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This article originally appeared on Auburn Wire: Why did Alex Golesh feel 'sick' after Auburn's win over Southern Miss?
