Coffee and Magnolia: 6 April 2015

BRACKETS

Today is the final day! Go vote for the winner of our Bracket of Brackets Challenge!

DIAMOND TIGERS

Well, it was a good weekend for some, and a not-so-good weekend for others. Let's get the bad part over with, first.

The baseball team dropped a home series to Arkansas this weekend. All of the games were close, late. Arkansas scored three late runs in the top of the 9th to take the 10-7 win on Friday night. The Tigers took one back on Saturday with the rare walk-off hit-by-pitch for Keegan Thompson's complete game 3-2 victory. Auburn dropped the rubber match on Sunday afternoon after allowing Arkansas to score late again in the 8th. The Tigers tried to rally, but just couldn't pull it off and fell to the Razorbacks, 6-4.

Things went a little better for Clint Myers' red-hot softball team. The ladies took their fourth straight SEC series to improve to 10-2 in conference play and 37-5 overall. They won the first game 6-2 on Thursday night, dropped the middle game 8-6 on Friday, and took the rubber 12-9 on Saturday after falling behind 6-0 in the first inning. Friday night's loss was the Tigers' first home loss of the season. They'll have a home game against UAB Wednesday night before traveling out to College Station to take on Texas A&M this weekend.

OTHER SPORTS

As I've pointed out previous, I know more happened in Auburn sports last week. A lot more. However, I'll be covering those a little later this afternoon in my Auburn Sports Update.

FOOTBALL

We tweet-cap'd Gus Malzahn's press conference on Saturday following the Tigers' first scrimmage of the spring. You can read what Gustav had to say according to the beat writers, here.

Of the news out there, most of it from each source is pretty much the exact same. Down to the headlines in some cases.

Here is the official site's story on the scrimmage, followed by the Montgomery Advertiser, AL.com, and the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.

Neither Alex Kozan nor Carl Lawson participated in the scrimmage. I would be shocked if either of them take part in A-Day. The coaches want to make absolutely sure they're healthy when the season kicks off.

Jeremy Johnson felt the offense was too inconsistent in the scrimmage, according to the Ledger-Enquirer. I don't know what makes me happier; hearing the defense is flying to the ball and having a blast, or that of the three interceptions in the scrimmage, none were thrown by Johnson.

The competition for Center is still ongoing, and Austin Golson is still splitting reps with Xavier Dampeer. I think it's Golson's job, personally, but that's purely a guess. We saw Dampeer in limited action last season, and we have zero clue how Golson has done or will do. I just think Golson ends up with the job.

Jason Smith was live on punt returns in the scrimmage. The coaches seem very excited about him. Hopefully he can provide the ability to flip field position - or take one to the house - that Auburn has had in punt returners for the last two seasons.

Another player who was live in the scrimmage was true-freshman (and early enrollee) quarterback Tyler Queen. I have some thoughts on why that might be. I could be way off base, but maybe not. If Johnson is as good as we hope he is, then there's a decent chance he goes pro after this season. In that case you would be left with Sean White (who hopefully doesn't have to see any meaningful reps this season) and then Tyler Queen. I think the staff wants to get Queen some action as close to game speed and tempo as possible in order to prepare him for the back-up role in 2016. I may be way off base there, but I have a feeling I'm not.

Muschamp is back to punching whiteboards again, it seems. And Gus Malzahn is just fine with that. We all know Muschamp is intense. He gets his "BOOM" nickname from a youtube clip from his first time at Auburn, after all.