Arkansas vs Auburn on Saturday was pure cinema, for all the wrong reasons.
The Hogs came out on top with a 24-14 win in a game that neither team seemed to want to win. From bad snaps and head-scratching 4th down decisions to a litany of turnovers, this beautiful disaster had it all. The span where Taylen Green and Hank Brown threw three interceptions in less than 30 seconds summed it up perfectly.
The first chunk of Arkansas’ season has been one hell of a roller coaster already, with the team losing games it should have won and winning games it should have lost.
Auburn football coach Hugh Freeze was absolutely livid after the game, throwing any player he could get ahold of under the bus after a dreadful afternoon in Jordan-Hare Stadium.
“There’s people open and I know that we’re running the football,” he said postgame. “We’ve got to find a guy that won’t throw it to the other team and we’ve got to find running backs that hold onto it.”
Brutal. Auburn’s supposed savior at the quarterback position, Hank Brown, threw three interceptions and was benched at halftime after saying he couldn’t wait to “dominate Arkansas.” Payton Thorne’s second-chance effort was a bit better, but he threw a critical pick, too. Tailback Damari Alston looked destined for a touchdown run before fumbling the ball into the end zone for a touchback.
Poor ol’ Auburn.
Former Ole Miss QB Sheds Light on Scumbag Hugh Freeze
Freeze’s behavior in the postgame presser caught the attention of many, including one of his former protegees in Bo Wallace, who played quarterback under Freeze at Ole Miss from 2012-14. During that time, he led the Rebels to a pair of bowl wins and even an upset over Alabama in his senior season.
“Why is it always someone else’s fault every time there’s a loss?” Wallace wrote on Twitter Saturday night. “When there’s a win I watch the press conferences just to count how many times the word ‘I’ is used…Appreciate what he did for me, my son won’t be playing for him though.”
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a player go in on his former coach like that – ever. Wallace was never viewed as an elite prospect for the next level, but he was certainly a solid college quarterback. Arkansas fans will remember that well, as he led the Rebels to two wins over the Hogs before they got their revenge in a 30-0 shutout in 2014.
Freeze has a solid reputation for developing unheralded quarterbacks like Wallace and Chad Kelly into solid starters, but he hasn’t done that at Auburn thus far. Thorne was mediocre last season after arriving from Michigan State, and dual-threat Robby Ashford was never able to cut it.
Auburn Football’s Got Woes
Quarterback was by far the Tigers’ biggest need in the offseason, and Freeze didn’t address it – who knows why. Now, Auburn is paying the price for that ineptitude as the offense struggles for a second year in a row. Wallace had a potential answer for that head-scratching QB void.
“We’re approaching the point that he’s thrown so many QBs under the bus that maybe no one wants to play for him?” Wallace continued on Twitter. “That dude has never helped me a day in his life…it was always only about getting a win for him so he could collect his extra 100 racks.”
It’s harder to paint a clearer picture than that, and Wallace has a point. Why would any prospective recruit, or especially their parents, look at Freeze throwing his players under the bus and want to go play for him?
Hugh Freeze said he needs to “find a guy” who can run the offense, but he had plenty of time to do that this offseason. Now’s not the time to cast stones at your quarterback room. He knew what he had in Thorne after last season’s struggles, and a three-star freshman like Brown should never have been expected to shoulder the load.
At the end of the day, Auburn is a prestigious football program. Just like the escorts he had on his burner phone at Ole Miss, a good quarterback in the transfer portal was just a call away for Freeze. But now, he’ll continue to whine into the microphone about a disaster he created for himself – with unintentional assistance from the Razorbacks.
Yes, in addition to Freeze’s complacency, Arkansas just might have been a secret ingredient to the bad recipe that’s plaguing Auburn.
Arkansas’ Secret Sabotage Leads to Auburn Demise
Freeze is only in his second season at Auburn, but it’s actually his third straight year facing Arkansas. In 2022, he marched into Razorback Stadium as the head coach of Liberty and pulled off a 21-19 upset. The Flames finished that season just 8-5, including embarrassing losses to UConn and New Mexico State. Outside of the Arkansas win, it was a relatively unimpressive campaign.
While Freeze’s success at Ole Miss definitely factored into his candidacy with Auburn, it’s entirely possible that he would not have gotten the job without that road upset over an SEC team.
Next, let’s consider Auburn’s 48-10 drubbing of Arkansas last season. For the Hogs, it took hot seat talk surrounding Sam Pittman to a fever pitch. For Auburn, the beatdown showed that Thorne might actually have what it takes to stick around as the Tigers’ starter. Heading into the game, the Tigers were a mediocre 5-4, but the win clinched their bowl eligibility in convincing fashion.
Thorne wasn’t spectacular in that route, as the running game did most of the damage, but he was an efficient 12 for 20 with 163 yards and three touchdowns. It was a late-season argument that maybe, just maybe, the offense could hum under Thorne.
Yes, the Tigers did go on to lose to New Mexico the following week, but they followed it up with a close loss to Alabama on a miracle. Through a certain lens, the Arkansas blowout can be viewed as a key part of Freeze’s decision to ride with Thorne for the 2024 season. It was, after all, Auburn’s most impressive performance of the season by far.
The problem for the Tigers, though, was massive overestimation of what they had vs what they had faced. That blowout was more of a result of Arkansas throwing in the towel on a terrible season than Thorne’s excellence as an SEC QB – clearly. Usually, consecutive wins against the same program generate momentum but in this case Freeze’s back-to-back wins appears to have actually sowed seeds of potential destruction in the Auburn football program.
Oh, How the Tables Turn…
Freeze was given a pass for going 6-7 last year, given it was his first season on the Plains and he inherited a dumpster fire after Bryan Harsin’s disastrous tenure. Auburn was supposed to show marked improvement in year two, but they simply haven’t. Two disastrous home losses to Cal and Arkansas have the Tigers sitting at 2-2 before they even enter the meat and potatoes of their schedule.
Auburn still has five ranked opponents in its remaining eight games, so the going only gets tougher from here. Freeze’s team will have to pull off an upset or two to even reach bowl eligibility this season, a far cry from the much higher expectations set forth by Auburn fans and media members.
It’s unlikely Auburn will part ways with Freeze after just two seasons, even if the rest of this campaign is as disastrous as it looks like it will be. That’s all the more good news for Arkansas.
In addition to being a huge confidence booster for this year’s Hogs, the dire state of the Tigers might provide another very winnable SEC game for Arkansas in 2025.
In the meantime, Auburn fans’ meltdowns will be a joy to watch.
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On3 discusses how Auburn moves forward after a disappointing start to the season.
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