In the heart of a throng of jubilant red jerseys, in the midst of a raucous Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium, sat a lone player in white.
Ricardo Louis stared blankly into the crowd, unwilling to believe what he just let occur. A ball he had caught hundreds--thousands--of times before, one he could catch in his sleep, he dropped.
Louis, who seized the mantle of the No. 1 receiver over the past few weeks, was plagued with drops all game. He let three passes escape him, two on the Tigers' final drive, and the last on fourth down.
"I didn't make plays when I needed to," Louis said. "It's by far, probably my worst game of the season, and it hurts."
The Tigers lost, 54-46 in four overtimes, in a game that left two of Auburn's better players, players who weren't expected to grow into the roles they have, in tears after the final horn sounded.
Carlton Davis, the freshman cornerback who assumed a starting role opposite senior Jonathan Jones, shambled slowly into the locker room, his head down and tears flowing.
Davis missed a tackle on the Razorbacks' first play of the fourth overtime, and with nobody behind him on the play, Drew Morgan reached the end zone with ease.
"It's a feeling you never want to experience," Davis said, his voice no louder than a hoarse whisper. "It's a painful feeling."
Those feelings, of Davis and Louis specifically, encapsulate the game as a whole for the Tigers, who, after battling back from an early multi-score deficit, twice had Arkansas facing 4th down in separate overtime periods, needing a stop to win.
But both times, the much-maligned Auburn defense allowed a back-breaking conversion, and failed to close out a win it so desperately needed.
The offense, despite being stuck with a total of seven dropped passes, racked up 417 yards in all. Sean White continued his solid play, throwing for 254 yards on 19 completions, while Peyton Barber eclipsed the 100-yard mark again with a 128-yard performance Saturday, while also finding the end zone four times.
But the defense gave up over 400 yards again--although 100 came in overtime--and allowed more than 200 on the ground.
It all coalesced into a bizarre game, a heartbreaker that punched the Tigers in the gut and left them grasping for answers.
With the loss, Auburn drops to 4-3 on the season and 1-3 in the conference, and it needs to pull out a win in one of its final four SEC games, each of which it likely will be the heavy underdog in.
"We're disappointed we lost," coach Gus Malzahn said. "That's a tough one. Our kids showed a lot of character, a lot of fight. Playing in the SEC on the road is tough. We didn't get it done when we needed to."
There is hope still, perhaps.
After the game, surrounded by reporters, Louis stared, with tears drying, into the cameras and issued a proclamation barely audible above the din of the crowd inside.
"I'm going to come back next week and make Ole Miss pay," Louis said. "I'm going to make Ole Miss feel my pain, because right now I'm hurt."
Louis looked unflinching, confident, and sincere, adamant he would funnel all his energy into the next game.
It remains to be seen if the rest of his team feels the same.
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