College Football Predictions – Auburn Tigers 2020 College Football Preview
2019 Recap
Record – 9-4
ATS – 9-4
The Tigers rode the arm and legs of freshman QB Bo Nix and bagged a nine-win season is a loaded SEC. All of their losses were understandable (at Florida, at LSU, Georgia, Minnesota – bowl) but expectations are always REALLY high at Auburn. We’ll call it a successful campaign, particularly when you consider that they managed to defeat ROLL TIDE in a 48-45 thriller at the end of the regular season.
2020 MEGALOCKS Opening Power Rating
West Division – #4
SEC – TBD
Auburn Tigers 2020 Outlook
OFFENSE
QB Bo Nix was inconsistent in his first season but managed to lead the team to wins over Oregon, Texas A&M, and Alabama. Nix booked a 16-6 TD to INT ratio and tallied 7 rushing TDs LY and should improve in year two. It hurts to lose J Whitlow at RB (763, 10 TD LY) and it will interesting to see what kind of RB room the Tigers can cobble together. There’s talent on board, but no proven #1 option. The WR group looks solid with the return of Seth Williams and the SPEED DEMON Anthony Schwartz and we’ve been told to expect more out of the TE position. The big worry on this side of the ball is on offensive line that returns just one starter, and we all know how this offense can get bogged down when the big boys underperform.
We’ll call for a slight downtick in production.
DEFENSE
The Tigers allowed fewer than 20 PPG on defense LY (19.5, #17 FBS) for the fourth consecutive season but have some yuuuuge shoes to fill in 2020. Auburn lost four (!) players to the NFL draft and they are particularly inexperienced in the secondary. Auburn still looks fine up front and they’ve done a great job reloading on the DL in recent seasons. That raw talent will be supported by an experienced LB group including KJ Britt who is one of the better LBs in the SEC. It’ll be interesting to see if they can get a bit more PENETRATION as they bagged fewer than 30 sacks LY (28) for the first time since 2016.
This looks like a very good but not “great” defense on paper.
SPECIAL TEAMS
The Tigers will need to find a new punter but bring back PK Anders Carlson (18/25 LY). They should be able to cobble together decent return units given the talent on hand.
Schedule Analysis
Overall – Two things to note regarding the plandemic schedule. They avoid Florida (WOO!) but need to go on the road to face Georgia in their second game. They finish with a pair of toughies (at ROLL TIDE, Texas A&M).
Potential ATS Trouble Spot – Texas A&M (December 5th)
This game comes after the big game with ROLL TIDE and it looks like a letdown spot.
Season Win Total
Over 6.5 -130
Under 6.5 +110
MEGALOCKS says:
That’s a nasty looking schedule. We set the line at “6.5” so will take a pass. Six or seven wins seems like the most likely outcome.
MEGAmazing Tidbits
Auburn has lost five of their last seven bowl games and have only managed to beat Purdue and Memphis over that time horizon.
MEGALOCKS Outlook:
You know there’s still a lot of talent on this squad but there are just 10 returning starters, a question mark at RB and the offensive line, and it can’t hurt to have lost so much talent on defense to the NFL. QB Bo Nix has every license to improve and we expect the front seven to be fine. Expect a six or seven win season and better things in 2021.
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http://www.secrant.com/rant/auburn-sports/
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