It was an evening kickoff, which meant an afternoon spent sitting in the tailgating tent, sorta-watching other games.
People coming and going in the tent make for good conversation, but seldom do they let you dissect the intricacies of a cover-two defense. Not that I’d prefer to do that over the former.
The thing you’d prefer to do is watch the game on CBS, but apparently they and Dish are having another spat, and that means we couldn’t get the Georgia at Tennessee game today. It only went to overtime, so thanks CBS and Dish.
Not that we would have seen the end. We would have been inside the stadium watching the Tigers play, which is precisely what we did.
Nova flew this evening:
So did these planes:
I do not know why people wave their shakers at planes, but they do.
Anyway, it was military appreciation night, so all of those themes were added to your usual Saturday night pageantry. And Nick Marshall might have earned his own appreciation night.
The quarterback ran for 140 yards and two scores and threw for 93 yards in a gameplan designed to show off his feet.
Tre Mason showed his off, too:
He gained 77 yards on the ground, 62 receiving yards and the game’s first touchdown.
The game almost got out of hand when Robenson Therezie managed an impressive interception and returned it 78 yards for the score. The best part are the crestfallen looks on the faces of the visiting Rebels fans in the background. I love the background atmosphere shots, the accidental documentary snapshot:
Auburn couldn’t put Ole Miss away, though, and the Rebels would fight back. All the while, Marshall just kept running.
Ole Miss churned up yards, and they eventually turned a three score deficit into a five-point affair. And despite allowing 464 yards, it felt like a game for the Auburn defense. At the end, when it counted, the defensive line came up huge. The Tigers beat Ole Miss 30-22, the first ranked opponent they’ve defeated since 2011, to go 4-1 on the season.
Here are the video highlights, edited to make the game look terribly lopsided. I assure you it was not:
