Auburn Brought Back To Earth, Still Can Exceed Expectations

Auburn's 5-0 start under new head coach Gene Chizik was surprising to many across the country. Many thought Auburn had some pieces in place from last year to start the season off well, but not many thought Chizik would have this Auburn team on the same page like he's had so far.

Saturday though, that momentum hit a speed bump with a 44-23 loss on the road at Arkansas.

Auburn is a team that can't afford lots of mistakes and miscues on either side of the ball, they don't have the depth, or the personnel to afford those mistakes and still beat a good football team.

Chizik acknowledged as much after the loss Saturday, saying the Tigers are a team with a "small margin for error". 

So while the first five games of the season have been all positive for Auburn fans and coaches, now you get to see what this team and new coaching staff is made of coming off a bad loss, and a performance from a team that looked unprepared.

But this loss needs to be kept in perspective.

If you asked any Auburn fan before the season whether they'd take a 5-1 start to the season, they'd take it in a heartbeat.

Saturday was the first time this season that Auburn looked not ready to play, and it resulted in a blowout in the first half, and the Tigers never recovered.

Now another layer of the onion will be peeled away as this new coaching staff and young team are forced to rebound for the first time this season.

Florida and Alabama showed Saturday why they are the best two teams in the league, they went on the road and dominated a very good opponent, and they did it with defense.

Early on that was Auburn's glaring weakness. In three of Auburn's first six games they gave up 400 yards of offense, or more.

Unlike in 2008, Auburn's offense will have to be on their "A" game every week, because the defense just isn't there right now.

At least Chizik and Auburn have a benchmark to work towards, and it will take a few recruiting classes to make that happen.

This won't be the last time this Auburn team loses a game like this either. That's what happens when you are rebuilding a program in a conference as brutal as the SEC.

In the meantime, it's just one loss, and this Auburn team is still 5-1. With home games against Kentucky and Furman still left on the schedule, seven wins is likely, and eight wins is very possible in 2009. 

There's no doubt this Auburn team needs to regain it's focus after a mistake filled game Saturday, but like Chizik has told this team from game one, the season is a 12 round fight, and the Tigers just dropped their first round of the year.

Auburn got a wake up call Saturday in Fayetteville, now Chizik faces his next big test as Auburn coach. Responding to a bad loss that exposed a fragile team.

The next week could tell us a lot about not only the rest of the season, but how the future of the program could shake out under Chizik.