The Auburn Tigers are hitting the back half of the month of October with an upset win over the Georgia Bulldogs, marking the first time since 2005 that the program defeated Georgia in Athens.
Auburn is now 4-2 on the season with a 2-2 record in SEC play, but still has a couple of tough matchups ahead of it to finish the month.
The first of those is LSU, who returns to Jordan-Hare Stadium for the first time since 2022. Alex Golesh held his weekly press conference on Monday, recapping the Georgia game and previewing the matchup against the boys from Baton Rouge.
Here are some of his most notable quotes from the session.
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On if there is an update on Xavier Atkins’ status with the team:
“We're still working through it. We're continuing to work through it. I don't have an update right now.”
On the step up that the sophomores on defense have made:
“It's this group that a majority of them played as freshmen, so there's this assumption that they're now veterans. They're still learning, and just as much as they're still learning how to play, they're learning how to win. They're learning what process looks like throughout a week. They're learning what Sunday to Monday to Tuesday—like in a lot of ways, you're teaching those little things every single day.”
On how important a proof of concept is:
“Yeah, I think it's always easier when there's proof of concept. You can point to and say, ‘Man, look at the way this guy's playing, but it's because of this, this, and this.’ You try to not ever spin it in the sense that the end result is what it's based off of. We're in an end result society. Everybody wants the right end result, and we're trying to unteach that piece of it. We all want to win. I want to win. Like I want to win in the worst way. But I don't want to let the win then cover up everything that's going on.”
On the players not listening to anything except what comes from their inner circle:
“There's so many opinions and thoughts that come into through social media, through people on campus, whatever. And the message has always been the same that for us to get to where we've got to go, you've got to listen to your inner circle, and your inner circle is your coaches and your teammates. In terms of your football, your day-to-day life, your family is not in your inner circle in that sense because their job is to tell you how good you are and pat you on the back. Your buddies outside of here, their job is to tell you how good you are, pat you on the back. Our job in your inner circle is to tell you the truth. And the truth sometimes is you don't do this well, don't do this well, don't do this well, but also, man, you're doing this well.”
On the improvement of the wide receivers after their performance Saturday:
“They're continuing to get better. The challenge is can we continue to do all the things without the ball in our hands that will help our run game, that will help our touch game. Those things are continuing to be a challenge, but I thought those guys stepped up in a big way.”
Auburn Undercover is an independent Auburn sports media company covering Auburn athletics, recruiting and insider news.
