Auburn players react to Georgia loss, fourth loss in five games

Hugh Freeze described Saturday's 31-13 loss to Georgia as "another step not in the direction that we had hoped."

It was Auburn's fourth loss in five games, dropping the Tigers to 2-4 on the season and 0-2 to start Southeastern Conference play. Hardly anyone expected Auburn to beat Georgia, but that didn't make the loss sting any less for Freeze and the players.

"We're just going through adverse times right now," said wide receiver KeAndre Lambert-Smith after the game. "Adversity builds character."

That's one way to put it. While the odds were always stacked against the Tigers to beat Georgia, no one around the program expected to be 2-4 halfway through the season.

Even against Georgia, Auburn still didn't get dominated. The Tigers were competitive for three quarters, keeping the game close and finding success moving the ball.

Running back Jarquez Hunter ran for 91 yards and averaged seven yards per carry, but only had 13 carries in the game.

Auburn was able to find success running the ball, but sacks and a few costly mistakes on critical downs stalled a few of Auburn's best drives.

"Early in the game we had a couple big runs and then later in the game we had a couple of big runs against them." Hunter said. "I mean, we could have ran the ball all day. We just had to execute in some areas."

Lambert-Smith also continued to impress after a lively start to the season, catching seven passes for 95 yards.

"I'm just being myself. I'm just trying to do what I can do to help the team win, whether that's doing more, I don't know," Lambert-Smith said.

Auburn still continued to show an ability to beat itself at times, a theme that defined the first three losses of the season.

"It is Auburn versus Auburn. We just beat ourselves," Hunter said. "We can beat anybody in the country. Cause I be like, we got the talent, we got the skill players and everything else to beat anybody."

If there's any positive side to the situation, the Tigers get a bye week before playing three more SEC games in a row. It's an opportunity multiple players described as a reset going into the second half of the season.

"We're coming into this bye week 0-0 and we want to start the new season off 1-0. That's our goal and that's what we're gonna work to achieve," defensive end Keldric Faulk said.