Auburn football fans did not have a pleasant Saturday. Auburn was pummeled by Georgia, falling 31-13 in front of raucous Bulldogs fans. To make matters worse, head coach Hugh Freeze and quarterback Payton Thorne were embroiled in a major issue due to a miscommunication on one play.
Auburn attempted a fourth-and-1 from their own 44-yard line to begin the fourth quarter, down 21-10. Tigers quarterback Payton Thorne was sacked in the backfield after what appeared to be an obvious botched play.
Hugh Freeze yelled at Payton, who was sitting on the bench, shortly after, as shown on the ABC broadcast.
Auburn football’s Payton Thorne ran the wrong play on crucial fourth-and-1 play against Georgia
Following the game, Freeze claimed that Payton made the wrong call. The play call was meant for Jarquez Hunter, who was averaging 8.3 yards per carry at the time.
“Yeah, he absolutely didn’t go with what we called,” Freeze answered. “Payton is a thinker.” He knows football. He decided to try running a zone read there. Everyone seemed perplexed, to me. But we were clearly not on the same page there.”
Thorne does not deny that the original playcall was a running play for Hunter. However, after the game, he implied that he is given the opportunity to make his own read on the play.
“We’re running a run play — I had an option to throw it, too,” said Thorne. “And by the look I got, I knew we had a guy I needed to deal with. Moved the back from his initial position and ran the play. And I believe it was No. 11, fell off the edge hard, and that’s who I was reading. And I don’t want to get into too much detail about it, I suppose. I could tell you everything, but I don’t think so. “Probably shouldn’t.”
The loss sends Auburn to a 2-4 record with a 0-3 conference record.
