With 29 seconds left in the first half and Auburn only down by three to No. 5 Georgia, it looked as though Sanford Stadium was in store for a back-and-forth, hard-nosed football game.
That notion was quickly proved wrong when Georgia's Jake Fromm dropped back and found Terry Godwin for a 38-yard touchdown that seemingly took away Auburn's momentum on either side of the ball.
Prior to a loss in Athens, the Auburn defense ranked No. 37 in total defense and No. 13 in scoring defense. However, with Kirby Smart's squad combining for 516 total yards, the fifth-ranked Bulldogs flipped the script.
While the Auburn defense played well in the first half, especially in the red zone, a plethora of Georgia offensive weapons seemed to wear down the Tiger secondary. Consistent plays of 15-plus yards slowly closed out Auburn and its offense, which totaled just 125 total yards in the second half and while being held scoreless.
Led by running backs D'Andre Swift and Elijah Holyfield, as well as Godwin, the Bulldogs' big-play ability proved to be too much for a normally solid Auburn defense to handle.
"When we're on the field we're expected to execute and execute at a high level," Auburn linebacker Deshaun Davis said. "We expect everyone to do their job, we just have to find a way to get consistent right now."
In the loss, Auburn surrendered 19 plays of 10-plus yards. On second-and-12 early in the fourth, Swift sprinted untouched for a 77-yard score that put the deficit at an unmanageable position for the Tigers.
Swift tallied 17 carries for a game-high 189 yards on 10.9 yards per rush. Opposite his success on the ground, Swift added 43 receiving yards on four catches.
Though it wasn't just Swift that was wheeling and dealing, fellow running back Elijah Holyfield had several long runs while the receiver tandem of Terry Godwin and Mecole Hardman consistently tested the Auburn secondary.
"You got to give credit to those guys, they came out and played an excellent game," safety Daniel Thomas said. "They just beat us in all three phases."
To Davis, watching Georgia's offensive weapons get out into free spacing was something Auburn's defense had seen.
"They stuck to their game plan and did what they've been doing all year," Davis said. "We had some mistakes and we had some guys not in the right spot. Sometimes we were in the right spot but they have some great backs and they busted our side and picked up about eight yards."
After letting up a season high in yardage, Auburn looks ahead to top-ranked Alabama on the road. Currently, the Crimson Tide rank first in the nation while averaging 565.6 yards per game.
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