Auburn Puts Finishing Touches On Game Preparation

After taking Monday off, Auburn practiced for just under two hours Tuesday, as they begin putting finishing touches on their game plan for Saturday night's contest with Washington State . Auburn kicks off at 6:45 CST from Pat Dye Field and the game will be televised by ESPN 2 and ESPN 2HD.

The Tigers have lost three of their last four openers dating back to 2002 in a Labor Day night loss to Carson Palmer and the USC Trojans. Auburn is 86-25-2 all-time in season openers. That is third best in SEC history. Tiger Coach Tommy Tuberville is 4-3 in season openers at Auburn .

Tuberville held his first regular season press conference today and here's what he had to say about Saturday's contest and the start of the 2006 season (courtesy of the Auburn Athletic Department)

Opening Statement...
"It's good to get started. It's good to have game week. We need to play a game to see where we are. We have a lot of excited players and a lot of excited fans all over, we are excited as a group of coaches and players who worked very hard this month, and we are looking forward to the beginning.

"We are playing a very good football team. If I could say anything about Washington State , over the years I have watched them and how they have done things and the thing that they do the best is they keep doing the same things over and over, and their players kind of grow up in their system. They haven't changed much on offense or defense in many years, so their players will come in here pretty confident in what they are doing. We'll get their best shot as hopefully they will get ours. We'll see what happens.

"Injury wise, it looks like Steve Gandy will probably be the only one who will miss the game. Going into this game there will be some doubt going into the next few days about some other guys, seeing if they can learn as much of the game plan as they possibly can.

"It is awfully hot. We had a very physical and hot practice this morning. We tried to keep their attention as long as we could, but it was really humid. It is going to be humid as we go on through the week. Because of the heat we are getting two groups ready to play. We know that we are going to have to play as many players as we have on our team, not just this week, but the next few weeks because the next two games after this are at 11:30 and at 2:30, so we are trying to get everyone ready to play on the first two- deep, and we'll play all those guys going into this game Saturday night.

"It should be exciting. I know there is a lot of excitement around. We'll try to keep our guys at one point most of the week and try to get them to the point where they are ready to play four quarters Saturday night."

On high expectations...
"We haven't talked much about it. Our players understand there is no reason for it, it is just a prediction, a projection, and we have a puzzle to put together as coaches. Each year the puzzle is different, you have different pieces that you have to put different places. I can remember in 2004 I thought we had a lot of pieces of the puzzle that weren't there and we ended up winning all of our games. So you never know how those are going to work out. You never know if you are going to find enough of those pieces and a lot of it depends on the other puzzle that you are playing during the week, how many pieces do they have in the right spots, and are they going to be ready to play their young guys that they are going to have to fill in. Predictions are great, it gives everyone something to talk about during the month of practice in August, but that's all they are. We are going to try to play the best we can, as Washington State will. Hopefully it's a good football game and both teams are healthy and ready to play, and it's the first game of a long season for both teams."

On players that improved during fall practice...
"When you lose three very good receivers, we've got to have some young guys step up. Robert Dunn played some last year, and obviously will play quite a bit in this game. Rodgeriquis Smith, a walk on, does not have a scholarship, but he will be a starter this week because of how he's practiced, how he's played and how he knows the offense.

Again, when it comes to our offense at a skill position, it is as much what you know as it is if you can do it. You have to be able to know what to do before you can use your talents, and sometimes players can play just by knowing, and having the experience of going out there and going through it. But we have a lot of good, young players at the wide receiver position. We will play some this year, some will get an opportunity to play Saturday night. How much we will just have to wait and see.

As I said a while ago, there are a lot of pieces to that puzzle we will have to move around, even after this game to try to find if they go in another spot, but that's what coaching is all about and hopefully we have enough in place this week to where we play a good game. No matter what the outcome is, we want to go out and find a lot of those pieces before we get into the SEC play next week."