Namely, his offense is not performing.

A Gus Malzahn offense had never dipped below 400 yards in five straight games in his five years controlling a college offense. Shoot, Tulsa went through the 2007 and 2008 seasons under Malzahn and only put up less than 400 yards three times.

Until this year, when Auburn’s hit a five-game stretch of sub-400 yard performances and has only reached that height one time in eight games.

A Gus Malzahn offense had never been held to fewer than 300 yards in two straight games in his five years flummoxing college defenses. Shoot, Malzahn’s offenses had dipped below 300 yards only four times in 67 games.

Until this year, when Auburn put up 278 yards in a win over Florida and followed it up with 248 in a loss to LSU.

“It’s frustrating to me when we’re not playing well on the offensive side,” Malzahn said. “It’s not just one thing. There are a couple different variables that are keeping us from playing better.

“We’ve got to find a way. That’s what I’m continually trying to do, trying new people, trying to figure out new pieces of the puzzle.”

Malzahn’s right about the “different variables” conspiring to hamstring his offense.

There are a number of theories as to why the Gus Bus is actually following the speed limit this year, and none of them fully explain the problem.

—Personnel is forcing Malzahn to go slower than he has in the past:

Auburn is averaging a play every 25.6 seconds this year, up from Malzahn’s average at Tulsa (one every 22.2 seconds) and slightly up from his average over 35 games at Auburn (one every 25.1 seconds).

But last year’s team ran a play every 26.0 seconds and shattered every meaningful mark in the Auburn offensive record book.

Of course, last year’s team also had Cam Newton.

In 2009 and this season — the non-Newton years — Auburn is 10-3 in games in which it runs a play faster than once every 25.1 seconds and 3-5 in games in which it does not.

This year, the Tigers are 3-1 when they’re faster — wins over Utah State, Mississippi State and South Carolina, loss to Clemson — and 2-2 when they’re slower — wins over Florida Atlantic and Florida, losses to Arkansas and LSU.

There’s a theory running parallel to the one mentioned above that Malzahn and the offense have taken the foot off the pedal to help the Tigers’ defense through its struggles this year by trying to dictate a slower game pace.

Head coach Gene Chizik said there’s no truth to that.

“We have not gone conservative to aid the defense,” Chizik said. “There was nothing where we definitively said we’ve got to get more conservative with X, Y and Z to help this part of our team. We’ve never done that.”

—QB troubles are forcing Malzahn to run more than he has in the past:

Auburn has run the ball 63.5 percent of the time this year and passed only 36.5 percent.

That proportion is — actually — right about in the middle of the road when it comes to a Malzahn offense.

Arkansas ran 64.1 percent of the time in 2006, Tulsa ran 61.4 percent of the time in 2008 and Auburn ran 68.8 percent of the time just last season, with the Cam Newton variable, of course.

The Arkansas and Tulsa examples are more instructive because both situations involved a pocket passing quarterback that necessitated a halfback-centric run game.

If that’s going to be the case, the quarterback needs to be putting up passing yards.

Auburn is getting 47.2 percent of its yards through the air, which is right between Malzahn’s ’06 Arkansas (39.6 percent) and ’08 Tulsa (53.0) squads.

The Tigers’ rate has dipped to 39.1 percent over the past month as they’ve lost their pass game a bit, and pass plays are down to 31.5 percent over that period.

“Our challenge has been throwing the football,” Malzahn said. “When we get passing yards down the field and get that rhythm, we’re a lot more effective offense.”

—Injuries are wreaking havoc on Malzahn’s best-laid plans:

Losing Emory Blake certainly hurt, especially with the Tigers struggling to find a downfield weapon to step up in his absence.

Trovon Reed’s injury hurt as well, but the Tigers also have a number of fast, lithe players that can fill his role.

Consider this: Reed has comprised 12.1 percent of Auburn’s pass offense in games he’s played this year. Blake has contributed three times that, 36.2 percent.

Five lineups in eight games on the offensive line — both because of injuries and ineffectiveness — have not helped either.

But Auburn — no matter where it turns for line help — is not going to come upon a seasoned veteran.

Tiger linemen had 15 combined career starts heading into this season.

Tulsa’s starting five had 11 career starts going into the 2007 season, and the Golden Hurricane put up 542.5 yards per game.

The main problem with Auburn’s offense this year seems to be one of consistency.

Malzahn’s calling card in his time at the college ranks has been finding a team’s strengths early in the season and augmenting his offense around them.

The Tigers haven’t displayed enough steadiness yet for Malzahn to get a true feel for what exactly this team can do.

The run game has sparkled at times, but Auburn doesn’t yet have an answer through the air for when teams stack the box against the run.

“That’s the bottom line for us,” Malzahn said. “The challenge that I’ve got is I’ve got to get us more consistent.”

With only four games left to go, Malzahn realizes time’s running out if he wants to get his team there.

“We’re just waiting on somebody to step up and I’m very confident that will happen,” Malzahn said. “We just need to do that pretty quick.”

MID-SEASON SWOON

Gus Malzahn’s vaunted offense has fallen on hard times over the past four games. After starting the season fairly strong, Auburn’s attack has been nothing more than mediocre over the past month.

POINTS PER GAME
First Four Games: 34.3

Past Four Games: 14.3

YARDS PER GAME
First Four Games: 373.8

Past Four Games: 319.8

PLAYS PER GAME
First Four Games: 59.5

Past Four Games: 71.5

YARDS PER PLAY
First Four Games: 6.3

Past Four Games: 4.5

RUSH YARDS PER GAME
First Four Games: 171.8

Past Four Games: 194.8

YARDS PER RUSH
First Four Games: 5.0

Past Four Games: 4.0

PASS YARDS PER GAME
First Four Games: 202.0

Past Four Games: 125.0

YARDS PER PASS
First Four Games: 8.0

Past Four Games: 5.6

RUN-PASS PLAY RATIO
First Four Games: 57.6-42.4

Past Four Games: 68.5-31.5

RUN-PASS YARD RATIO
First Four Games: 46.0-54.0

Past Four Games: 60.9-39.1

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Oh yeah, just about every year.

And make no mistake, this season’s game against the Rebels is big for the Tigers. Maybe the biggest.

Seriously.

When you look at everything Auburn stands to gain (or lose) Saturday, this year’s installment is significant.

For a couple reasons: 1) because of where this game falls every season as the last one in the “respect” month (remember … October Victories Equal Respect?) … 2) because it’s a Western Division opponent … 3) because of what it means for the rest of the season, for both teams … 4) because of the history.

Even before Gene Chizik was named head coach, this game has consistently meant a lot.

In 2004, Auburn beat Ole Miss in Oxford to clinch the SEC West before the month of November began.

In 2008, Auburn’s 17-7 loss was the fifth — including the last of four in a row — of seven disappointing losses that put the finishing touches on Tommy Tuberville’s 10 years as head coach on the Plains.

In 2009, Auburn’s 33-20 win on Halloween stopped a three-game losing streak in Chizik’s first season, giving the Tigers the momentum needed to finish out an eight-win season.

Even last year, the game in Oxford had significant meaning, as most people thought it’d be a trap game for the undefeated Tigers and a game that could cause a severe hiccup in a Heisman Trophy campaign. That didn’t happen, obviously, as Auburn took care of the Rebels by 20 points to finish the month of October at 9-0.

This year, even though the circumstances are different, the stakes are just as high.

Bottom line: Auburn needs to win.

And not just a win — The Tigers need to play well. The offense needs to figure itself out and the defense needs to continue improving.

Why?

Where do we start?

First, it would give the Tigers a 3-2 record for the month of October. No small feat.

Second, heading into the bye week, a team needs all the momentum it can get. Not only is an open week good for getting healthy, which the Tigers desperately need, it can serve as a launching pad for the final stretch of the season.

What’s better, two weeks of celebrating a win or two weeks of mulling over a loss?

Hmm.

Third, Georgia’s up next. After the bye, the Tigers have to go to Athens. And lest we forget how badly the Tigers have played in Athens in their last couple trips.

The last game Auburn won between the hedges was the fourth-and-10, Brandon Cox to Devin Aromashodu to Courtney Taylor (after the fumble) to John Vaughn for the game-winning field goal in 2005.

Since, Auburn’s been 0-fer in Athens. I’m quite sure the Tigers want to change that. And having two weeks to prepare for the Bulldogs will help. But so will a win over Ole Miss now.

If Auburn can beat Ole Miss and Georgia, the Tigers would be 7-3 with Samford up next for homecoming.

Make that 8-3.

Then it’s on to the Iron Bowl.

Hey, an 8-4 season isn’t bad.

Especially this year. With this schedule. With this youth.  With this inexperience.

Eight wins put the Tigers in a decent bowl. Some are even projecting the Cotton Bowl. From where Auburn started against Utah State, Dallas might as well be Glendale.

The Tigers have the chance to get there, but they’ve got to take care of business. It starts Saturday against Ole Miss.

A big game?

When is it not?

MIKE SZVETITZ is sports editor of the Opelika-Auburn News. He may be reached at mszvetitz@oanow.com or 737-2513.

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Houston Nutt is trying to figure out what happened to his Rebels during their second-half collapse against Arkansas last week.

Gene Chizik is trying to figure out why Ole Miss is three games below .500.

“It’s the best 2-5 team in the country,” Chizik said. “They’re very dangerous, and they’re very good in a lot of different ways. … They’re probably a play here or a play there away from winning five or six football games.

“I think the record is not indicative of how good they are. They’re a very good football team.”

However, Ole Miss’ 0-4 record in the SEC speaks for itself, culminating in a disappointing loss to the 10th-ranked Razorbacks this past week.

The Rebels jumped out on Arkansas 17-0 in the first half at home, stunning the SEC’s leading offense. However, they weren’t able to hold the Razorbacks down for long, as Arkansas ripped off 29 unanswered points to win 29-24.

And Ole Miss could do nothing to stop it.

“The same fire and attitude that we come out with in the first quarter has to be the same in the third quarter,” Nutt said. “The first 5 minutes of the game and the first 5 minutes of the third quarter are so important. You cannot look for things to go wrong. You have to expect good things.

“That is the way you started the game and that is the way you want it to finish.  We have been talking really hard on that.”

Nutt’s also working hard on not letting last week’s loss affect the Rebels this week.

“When you don’t have success it is easy to fall into that mindset of either something bad is going to happen or something bad is going to happen even when good things are going on,” the head coach said. “We have to have the mindset that good things are going to happen.  Guys are going to make plays. We are going to win. We have to keep believing that. That is the mindset of the coaches and the players. We have to keep believing that and playing for 60 minutes.”

Auburn knows a thing or two about not letting a bad loss carry over to the next game.

The Tigers were handed their worse loss in three years by No. 1 LSU in Baton Rouge last week, 45-10.

An “anemic” blocking performance by the offensive line and a handful of mental mistakes on defense turned Auburn’s upset bid into a beatdown at the hands of the Bayou Bengals.

But Auburn, like Ole Miss, is determined to not let last week’s game dictate this week’s matchup at Jordan-Hare Stadium. They’re both focused on the task at hand.

Ole Miss has got to stop Auburn’s rushing attack, which, despite the Tigers’ lack of consistent offensive output and points, is still fourth in the conference (183.2 yards per game) and led by the dynamic duo of Mike Dyer and Onterio McCalebb.

Dyer is third in the conference, averaging 101.5 points per game, while McCalebb has turned into a dual threat that can hurt you running the ball — averaging 5.6 yards per carry — or catching the ball out of the backfield — 10.9 yards per catch.

“We talked hard … about being better tacklers and better run fits, especially against Auburn,” Nutt said. “Michael Dyer is, of course, very good. They have speed guys as well with him, and you know they are going to run the football. That is no secret.”

Auburn, meanwhile, will have to key on speedster Jeff Scott, who has six touchdowns and averages 4.5 yards per carry at the running back spot, and dual threat quarterback Randall Mackey.

Mackey, who has shared time with Zack Stoudt behind center, has emerged as the Rebels’ top QB. Against Arkansas, Mackey threw for 219 yards and two touchdowns, while rushing for 30 more yards and another score.

“I think they found themselves in exactly where they want to go in terms of quarterback,” Chizik said. “(Mackey’s) extremely athletic, very dangerous, a very good junior college player.”

Auburn will go with Clint Moseley again at quarterback for his second consecutive start.

Moseley had a rough first outing as a starter, as he was sacked six times against LSU. But when the sophomore did have time, he made some plays, finishing 12-for-20 passing for 145 yards and an interception.

“For his first game and being in an environment like that playing against a defense that was as good as they were, and him being under duress as much as he was, I think when he had opportunities to make plays, I thought he did a nice job of that,” Chizik said. “He’ll continue to improve, I don’t think there’s any question about that, and we expect him to do that this week.”

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Especially when that past includes an exceptionally ghastly performance by Auburn’s offensive line against LSU last Saturday.

“I’m not looking back at last Saturday,” Grimes said with a wry smile.

But, as the saying goes, those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

So Grimes and his linemen watched the six sacks LSU recorded, the most given up by Auburn since 2006.

They watched Auburn’s potent run game grind to a halt to the tune of 87 yards and 2.6 yards a carry, with 63 of those yards coming on the final drive, when the game was well out of hand.

Grimes’ linemen saw everything they did wrong against LSU.

Then they put it all behind them.

“We didn’t play very well. I think that’s obvious. In any phase of the game,” Grimes said. “If you sit back and worry about what happened last week too long, you get yourself in trouble.

“For us, literally, that game was done Sunday when we finished looking at that tape.”

Grimes and his linemen have stressed this week that the main problem was communication.

Senior left tackle A.J. Greene said, with the crowd noise, the linemen couldn’t effectively convey assignments to each other, and they didn’t always know who was blocking which LSU blitzers.

Senior right tackle Brandon Mosley said, with the lungs of 93,098 at Tiger Stadium doing their work, he never even heard the snap count. He just had to go off ball movement.

Communication breakdowns, coupled with an aggressive, talented defense, yielded a nightmarish day for the Auburn front.

“When you’re at home and the center makes a call, everybody can hear the call,” Grimes said. “When you’re on the road, that call is probably not going to be heard by the tackles. The guards have to pass that call out to the tackles and the tackles to the tight ends and from all of us to the running backs and fullbacks.

“There’s an added level of communication and an added amount of importance on each guy being able to do that.”

It’s an issue that’s popped up throughout the season for the Tigers’ young line, even when Auburn’s at home.

People aren’t always entirely sure of their assignments.

“It’s a problem. It continues to happen,” Greene said. “But it’s kind of hard to be like it’s not going to happen because at the end of the day it happens. Every offensive line has communication issues.

“It’s showing a lot more now because we’re taking the hits.”

Communication also walks hand in hand with continuity.

Last year’s line — even if it wasn’t entirely sure on all the calls — could fall back on habit because it had played together enough to achieve an impressive level of cohesion.

This year’s line has been through five different lineups in eight games, with somebody like Chad Slade having to play right tackle and right guard before winding up at his new home of left guard due to Jared Cooper’s season-ending injury.

“You adjust to one guy, the way he plays, the way he calls calls, and then somebody else comes in and he might call it a different way,” Greene said. “That’s another thing that can play a factor in communication, but that’s not an excuse not to be able to communicate.”

The lineup, at least has normalized.

Grimes said he’s sticking with the starting five of Greene, Slade, Reese Dismukes, John Sullen and Mosley again this week for the third game in a row.

The LSU game ended for that group on Sunday.

But what’s that thing they say about remembering the past?

“I didn’t expect it to go that way at all, but then what can we necessarily do about it now?” Greene said. “We just have to take that and look at is as motivation to get better.”

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Having already secured a berth in next week’s SEC Tournament at Orange Beach, Friday’s night match will determine Auburn’s seed.

Auburn goes into the match 11-5-2, 5-4-1 SEC and can finish as high as the fifth seed or as low as the seventh seed in the SEC standings. It has already clinched second place in the SEC West.

Auburn has won five straight in the series after claiming a 2-1 overtime win last season at home. The all-time series is 11-6-2 in Auburn’s favor.

Volleyball travels to Ole Miss, alabama
The Auburn Tigers (9-13, 3-9 SEC) begin the season’s stretch run with their next-to-last road trip of the year this weekend as they make their last two SEC West visits of the year.

The Tigers will travel to Ole Miss on Friday night for a 7 p.m. match against the Rebels, then they will head to Tuscaloosa for a Sunday showdown with archrival alabama. First serve is set for 1:30 p.m.

Live video for Friday’s match will be available through OleMissSports.com, and Sunday’s match can be viewed via live video from RollTide.com.

Live stats for both matches are available at AuburnTigers.com, and fans can follow @AUVolleyball on Twitter for updates throughout the weekend.

No. 3/5 women’s golf set to close fall season
The No. 3/5 Auburn women’s golf team will travel to Wilmington, N.C., this weekend to play its final tournament of the fall season at the 10th Annual Landfall Tradition.

The 18-team field features six teams ranked in the top 25 in the nation.

Players will tee off in three-player pairings from the Nos. 1 and 10 holes on Friday and Saturday with a shotgun start for Sunday’s final round. Fans can follow along with live stats at http://www.GolfStat.com.

Gray evens fall World Series with 4-3 win
Spurred by six defensive double-plays, five of which were inning-enders, the Gray Team evened the Fall World Series at a game apiece with a 4-3 win on Thursday evening. Game 3 of the series will take place on Sunday at 12:30 p.m.

The Game 3 pitching matchup pits Dillon Ortman (Gray) vs. Trey Cochran-Gill (White).

Friday night the team will host the annual Celebrity Home Run Derby at 7 p.m. Fans are encouraged to get to the field early for a 6 p.m. 2012 team autograph session.

A $2 donation at the gates is requested and for every $5 donated on top of that fans will be entered to win prizes.

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Read that line again.

Onterio McCalebb: The Tigers’ No. 1 receiver.

Kind of odd for a team with 15 wide receivers listed on its roster.

It’s not exactly something the Auburn running back was expecting heading into his junior season.

“To tell you the truth, no I wouldn’t (have expected be Auburn’s leading pass-catcher),” McCalebb said. “Right now I can be the leading receiver, but I don’t look at stuff like that. I just play the game and do what I can do to help the team win.”

McCalebb leads the Tigers with 22 catches this year and is second on the team with 239 receiving yards.

True, most of McCalebb’s receptions have come on screens, swings, dumpoffs and other throws that don’t travel more than 3 or 4 yards past the line of scrimmage.

But he’s also shown the ability to take short passes and make them into sizable gains.

“He has been carrying a big load, but he is a guy we can hang our hat on. He’s a true champion,” offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn said.

And Auburn hasn’t gotten much of anything going in its downfield passing game over the past three weeks, with top threat Emory Blake shelved with a bum ankle.

McCalebb has caught seven passes for 68 yards in that span, trailing only Philip Lutzenkirchen (82) and DeAngelo Benton (80) in yardage over the past three weeks.

“He’s huge for this offense. He can do so many different things,” quarterback Clint Moseley said. “Coach Malzahn says he’s the fastest player in college football — and it’d be hard to argue.”

McCalebb’s receiving numbers this year are even more impressive when pitted against his stats from his first two years at Auburn.

He caught only 13 passes for 144 yards in his first 25 games with the Tigers.

And, to hear junior receiver Travante Stallworth tell it, he was lucky to catch that many.

“I remember when I first got here, he couldn’t catch very good,” Stallworth said. “Now, he’s become the double threat. Defenses don’t know whether he’s going to catch the ball out of the backfield or he’s going to run the ball.”

Now, he’s caught a ball in a team-high 11 straight games.

Oh, and he’s the Tigers’ second-leading rusher as well, with his 387 yards behind only Mike Dyer’s 812.

McCalebb is first among SEC running backs in receptions, second among Auburn Tigers with 88.8 all-purpose yards per game, 10th on Auburn’s all-time running back receiving yards list and averages 6.9 yards a touch on offense this year.

“He has been a great leader for us the last two years, and we need to continually find ways to get him the ball,” Malzahn said.

So he’s got the versatility angle taken care of.

But what about toughness? Durability’s always been a worry for the slight, 175-pound McCalebb, especially as he makes his living between the tackles more this year.

McCalebb took a pop from LSU safety Eric Reid at the end of a 14-yard catch Saturday and had to come off the field, forcing him to sit out the next play.

He wasn’t too pleased with that.

“It doesn’t matter if I get real hard and I’m on the ground for a second, I still don’t want to come out of the game,” McCalebb said. “I’ll do whatever for my team. That’s the kind of person I am.”

Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt, though.

“I got my bell rung a lot on that play,” McCalebb said. “I got back in the game. It doesn’t mean anything because in the SEC everybody gets hit hard. You just have to get back up and in the game.”

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Head coach Gene Chizik said he’s “feeling a little bit better” about Blake playing this week than he did last Wednesday, but it’s still going to be a game-time decision.

“He has tried to do more,” Chizik said. “He is not where we would like him to be, so only time will tell over the next 72 hours or whatnot. But right now for him to say he can play in the game full tilt, I can’t say that.”

Blake injured his right ankle in the third quarter against South Carolina on Oct. 1 and has dressed out the past three weeks, only playing a snap or two against Florida on Oct. 15.

Wide receivers Trooper Taylor said Blake “tried to go a little bit” during Wednesday’s practice and “wasn’t full-speed.”

“If he’s healthy enough to play, he’ll be out there. If he’s not, we’ll go with what we’ve got,” Taylor said. “He’s not a kid that wants to miss. I can tell it’s been bothering him a lot.”

Line hierarchy
Offensive line coach Jeff Grimes said redshirt freshman Eric Mack will be the first lineman off the bench in case of injury.

Mack, a 6-foot-4, 330-pound guard is currently the third guard in the Tigers’ playing rotation.

And, if a tackle goes down, right guard Chad Slade moves to tackle and Mack still steps in at guard.

Grimes said redshirt freshman Tunde Fariyike would be the next player up if center Reese Dismukes goes down.

With Jared Cooper — who could play any of the three interior positions — out for the year, Grimes said he needed somebody to step up, and Mack and Fariyike did.

“The last two weeks, both of those guys have gotten a lot better. They really have,” Grimes said. “They have responded well. I’m more pleased with them right now than I have been at any point.”

Sophomore Blake Burgess, who was the Tigers’ all-purpose interior guy early in the year, has moved down on the line depth chart, Grimes said, but he continues to serve an integral role as an extra blocking tight end.

“Blake is doing some other things for us, helping us out in some other formations and getting us and extra body on the field,” Grimes said. “We’re so thin we’re trying to get an extra body on the field — whether it be another lineman or another tight end.”

Too deep
Freshman running back Tre Mason hasn’t been doing anything wrong to not be seeing much action as the Tigers’ third back, running back Curtis Luper said.

It’s just a function of having such talented backs — Mike Dyer and Onterio McCalebb — in front of him.

“With Onterio and Michael being such a focal point for us offensively, it’s kind of hard to get the ball around,” Luper said. “Those guys just refuse to come out of the game.”

Mason has 12 carries for 64 yards on the year, with only three rushes for 30 yards in the past four weeks.

No regrets
Grimes said he doesn’t regret not playing freshmen Greg Robinson and Christian Westerman early in the year, basically consigning them to redshirt years.

“Not because I don’t think they could have stepped in, but the bottom line is that they weren’t the best fit at the time — and they’re still not,” Grimes said.

Grimes said both players have been making great progress — especially over the past three weeks — and the ship has not definitively sailed yet on them playing this year.

But they’re working more for the future.

“You’re not just trying to play for now because you may not get on the field this year. Good chance you won’t,” Grimes said. “You’re getting yourself ready for next year.

“The future is going to be really, really bright for those two kids.”

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The Tiger defensive tackle’s eyes are trained on one player in particular: freshman cornerback Robenson Therezie.

“We’re like, ‘Who’s he going to get this time?’” Whitaker said. “Bam! It’s like, ‘Aw, he did it again. Nice.’

“Watching special teams, it’s like I’m at the movie theater eating popcorn.”

Therezie, the Tigers 5-foot-9, 192-pound corner, earned a reputation as a bit of a head hunter at Miami’s Jackson High.

He hasn’t dissuaded anyone of that notion in his short time at Auburn.

“If you go back and look at his high school tape, it’s like, ‘Ain’t no way he’s doing this. It’s got to be some special effects or something,’” freshman safety Erique Florence said. “But then you see it in real life. We got the chance to see him put some guy to sleep. I’d never seen that that close before.

“He bring it when he bring it.”

Therezie has logged 11 tackles in limited action this year, including a team-leading five on special teams.

Most of them have been the bone-jarring variety.

Therezie earned the nickname “Cadillac” when he was a running back in youth football, from a coach who said he reminded him of former Auburn great Carnell “Cadillac” Williams.

That nickname could start to take on a new meaning. Such as “hits like a …”

“It’s how I’ve played the game since I signed up for it,” Therezie said. “People ask me why do I hit, tackle like that, dive at people? When I see myself doing that, I’m just going for the ball. I go for the ball. We’ve been trained to tackle in a position, but, I’m not quite comfortable with that.

“I don’t want to be a ‘me’ guy, but I like to tackle the way I’m comfortable tackling.”

That got him in trouble against Florida on Oct. 15.

The Gators ran an option with quarterback Trey Burton and running back Chris Rainey in the second quarter, with Burton pitching the ball off a split second before a navy-and-orange flash hit him right under the jaw.

Flag. Personal foul on Therezie. First down Florida.

And please take a seat, Robenson.

“I clotheslined him. Something like Ray Lewis and them boys in the league,” Therezie said. “Since I got that penalty on the hit on the quarterback, that was it for me.”

All part of the learning process, part of Therezie finding a way to channel that aggression in a way that helps the team instead of hurting.

His aggressiveness also worked against him in a big way against LSU on Saturday, when he got in an ineffective jam on receiver Rueben Randle at the line — in a situation in which he absolutely couldn’t lose Randle because he had no safety help over top — and Randle ran right by him for a 42-yard touchdown catch.

“You just have to have short-term memory,” said senior safety Neiko Thorpe, a cornerback in his first three years at Auburn. “That can make or break you. You’re only as good as your next play. There’s no point in dwelling on that one play.”

Therezie’s been in the ear of sophomore cornerback Chris Davis — among others — trying to bring himself entirely up to speed with the college game.

He’s got the confidence part taken care of already.

“I’ve been here long enough to know everything and be trusted to be on the field,” Therezie said. “And confident enough to face anyone that’s in front of me no matter how big he is or how much fame he has.”

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He just wants to find a better way to do that without messing up flow of whoever’s behind center.

“It keeps the quarterbacks out of his rhythm,” Malzahn said. “I’ve got to do a better job of keeping the guys in rhythm.

“It’s fair to say it’s been tough — especially last week with Clint (Moseley) getting into a rhythm. I need to do a better job of helping him do that.”

Frazier has been seeing at least a handful of snaps every week since the Florida Atlantic game on Sept. 24, the highwater mark coming with his 25 plays against Arkansas.

The freshman ran 18 plays Saturday against LSU to Moseley’s 40, completing 2-of-4 passes for 16 yards and rushing nine times for 31 yards.

Moseley went 5-for-8 for 80 yards on pass plays immediately following his re-entry to the game after Frazier’s snaps.

Blake practices
Malzahn answered affirmatively when asked if junior wideout Emory Blake practiced Tuesday night, but did not elaborate on his progress.

Blake, the Tigers’ leading receiver, injured his right ankle in the fourth quarter against South Carolina on Oct. 1 and has been shelved since then, playing only a snap or two against Florida on Oct. 15.

Malzahn said freshman wideout Trovon Reed practiced only one day last week before returning against LSU and catching two passes for 26 yards after missing three weeks with a shoulder injury.

“The fact that Trovon came back, that was a positive. He has the ability to stretch the field vertically,” Malzahn said. “It was a limited role, but his role will expand.”

Auburn’s ‘Ironman’
Auburn head coach Gene Chizik said he could ask sophomore defensive end Craig Sanders to go out and play offensive guard if he wanted to.

Chizik’s not going to do that, but he could.

“He’s one of those guys that never says a word, comes to work every day,” Chizik said. “We consider him a starter because of his value to the defense, and his flexibility to be able to do more than one thing. He’s kind of the ironman guy.”

The 6-foot-4, 260-pound Sanders has played both power and quick end for the Tigers this year, along with a brief stint at defensive tackle during the South Carolina game.

Sanders has nine tackles and 4.0 tackles for loss this year.

“The value of a guy like that to your team is probably overlooked a lot of times,” Chizik said, “but not by the coaches and his teammates.”

GSR numbers released
The NCAA released its newest batch graduation success rate numbers Tuesday, which measure the percent of student-athletes who enrolled at a school between 2001 and 2004 that graduated within six years.

Auburn’s football team earned a score of 63, the sixth-best mark in the SEC and the same as its mark last year, but still below the FBS average of 67 percent.

The Tigers’ men’s basketball team graduated 29 percent, well below the national average of 66.

The football players included in the report came in under Tommy Tuberville’s stint as head coach and most of the men’s basketball players came in when Cliff Ellis was coaching.

Auburn’s men’s tennis and women’s golf teams earned perfect scores of 100, and the school’s sports teams had an overall GSR of 76, slightly below the national average of 80.

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Auburn’s sophomore quarterback has a weeklong appointment with the trainer’s table and a standing reservation for an ice water bath after taking a series of hard shots in the Tigers’ loss to LSU on Saturday.

“It’s been awhile since I’ve been hit like that,” Moseley said. “It’s actually been 20 years, since I’ve never been hit that hard that many times.”

But he’s not broken.

After a first start out of which Moseley said he could take “nothing positive,” he at least knows that he took a licking and kept on ticking, physically and mentally.

“That was a learning situation,” Moseley said. “To go through that and come out alive, basically — I don’t want to be that dramatic — but mentally fine, I was able to keep my composure the whole time. Obviously, I wanted to do perfect the whole day. But for me personally, it’s good to know I’m able to handle something so big.

“It’s good to get the toughest start out of the way first.”

Moseley weathered his first “learning situation” at one of the toughest venues in the country against the top-ranked team in the country.

On top of that, Auburn’s uneven pass protection made it so that the sophomore saw some combination of white, purple and gold in his face for most of the day.

LSU sacked Moseley six times, the most sacks Auburn has given up since a loss to Arkansas in 2006 and the most times a Tigers quarterback has gone down in a game since Jason Campbell was sacked seven times in a loss to Georgia Tech in 2003.

The pass protection Saturday, in the words of Auburn head coach Gene Chizik, was “anemic.”

Still, Moseley completed 12-of-20 passes for 145 yards and an interception.

Not the most outstanding debut ever, but enough to give Auburn its healthiest passing attack since its 30-14 win over Florida Atlantic on Sept. 24.

“When we gave Clint time to throw, he made some throws,” Chizik said. “I think he made some throws at times when he didn’t have time.”

When Moseley had a pocket, he had time to survey the field, pick out Philip Lutzenkirchen for a 16-yard gain on third-and-10 and get Auburn out of dodge at its own 4-yard line.

When Moseley didn’t have a pocket, he scrambled left, faced down an LSU defender, then pulled up right before hitting the line of scrimmage to loft a 30-yard pass to DeAngelo Benton for a first down in LSU territory.

That drive ended in two straight sacks.

“When we went three-and-out and gave up a sack, he’d come to the O-line and say, ‘Come on y’all, we can do it, we can do it. I still trust you guys. Give me a little time,’” right guard John Sullen said. “He’s a very patient guy. But when it comes down to it, we’ve just got to protect better.”

Moseley didn’t want to dwell on the sacks. He didn’t even want to dwell on the good throws he made.

The thing that stuck out most to him was his worst throw: the pick-6 to Ron Brooks in which he stared down Benton on an out route, Brooks read his eyes, broke on the ball and took it 28 yards to the house.

“That’s something I’ve just never got to do again,” Moseley said. “It’s pretty simple. I just can’t make that mistake.

“I’ve got to see him.”

Moseley will get the chance to keep honing his craft this week and — if he keeps giving Auburn coaches more glimpses of his potential — for more weeks to come.

The bumps and bruises will go away. The experience that accompanied them will not.

“It’s going to get easier from here. There’s no doubt,” Moseley said. “(Things) slowed down gradually Saturday, but I do realize they could slow down a little more.

“I think I’ll be a lot better this Saturday than I was last Saturday.”

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