Auburn makes history with Week 2 win over Cal

Auburn football made history with a 14-10 Week 2 victory over Cal at California Memorial Stadium according to the Power of Dixieland Twitter/X account — being the first SEC school to ever march into the state of California and win in a non-conference matchup.

“Auburn becomes 1st team in Southeastern Conference history to win a road game in California after conference was previously 0-8,” the account wrote.

AU beat the Golden Bears despite losing the battle in total yards and time of possession battle by nearly ten minutes. Payton Thorne’s 5-yard touchdown pass to Rivaldo Fairweather with 6:31 left in the fourth put the Tigers up for good.

Auburn football holds Cal provocateur to merely decent showing

Running back Jadyn Ott entered Cal’s Week 2 matchup with Auburn football as the primary villain to the Plains due to his now freezing-cold take that the AU brand isn’t matched by the program’s production on the field.

“There’s a lot of focus on the name Auburn,” Ott prefaced on September 6 before saying, “But what I see on film is not really in comparison to what their name is. I just want to get that into my guys’ heads that a name doesn’t mean anything.  And at the end of the day, they’re still human, and we have just as much of a chance as they do to go in there and get the win. It will be very encouraging when we do get this win. But I feel like our focus is going to be, um, not letting it get to our head and getting too big-headed after we do get the dub.”

He left averaging under four yards per carry, which is impressive on behalf of the Tiger defense considering Ott’s All-True Freshman team status from 2022 and 2023 All-Pac-12 Preseason First Team status via PFF. In all, AU’s defense stood out more than the offense, and more than Cal on both sides of the ball as well. Eugene Asante’s 12 tackles, 1.5 TFL, and a sack led the charge for Ron Roberts’ unit.