Bryan Harsin breaks down Auburn quarterback battle, highlights early mistakes

Auburn head coach Bryan Harsin broke down the team’s quarterback battle on Sunday while speaking about early wins and mistakes they’ve made. Auburn is facing a major decision at the position, having to choose between three separate quarterbacks who transferred in to the program and a true-freshman in Holden Geriner.

TJ Finley took control of the Tigers offense late last season after transferring into the program from LSU in 2021 and is the incumbent quarterback in the battle. Adding to the decision, former Texas A&M QB Zach Calzada and former Oregon QB Robby Ashford.

Bryan Harsin on Auburn’s quarterback battle

“I thought all did some really good things,” said Harsin after their first scrimmage. “Finley operated well tonight. We had a long drive on the very first drive with the first group, it’s about 14 plays. So we executed well on that drive. I thought Robby did well too, making some plays and operated the huddle and did some good things on his part. Calzada, solid tonight. Had a touchdown as well.”

Later during his press appearance, Harsin was asked about how he felt about Finley’s control of the offense and the Tigers’ coach highlighted his ability to lead from the field.

“I’ve always been impressed with TJ as far as, just his command. He understands — he’s very much like a coach on the field. He understands what we’re trying to accomplish. I think he conceptually picks things up very quickly. Listens to the details and all the little nuances of plays and what everybody is supposed to be doing. If there’s a coaching point made, not just for him but anybody, he’ll remember that coaching point and be able to echo it whenever it comes up or remind guys. It doesn’t have to be a coach, which you appreciate. He’s got a really good understanding of what we’re trying to accomplish.”

CLICK HERE to subscribe to the On3 YouTube channel today for all of the latest news on college football, recruiting, NIL, more!

Harsin also explained that they were prepared to start defining their depth chart in a better way now that they had some game footage to go off of. While he’s not ready to call a starter just yet, the majority of the practice reps will begin going to the players they think are best for the job.

“I’ll watch it tonight and I think we’ll see some of that on film,” said Harsin about who is emerging as a front-runner. “The one thing I told our guys — every one of those guys wanna play. And we’re gonna play the best guys. They all deserve an opportunity to go out there, which we’ve given every one of our guys to showcase what they can do. And now we gotta start making some decisions. We gotta start figuring out who’s gonna get a little bit more reps.

“It’s not just, hey that guy throws the ball perfectly or the best every time. You want that, but how’s he operating? What’s he doing? Is this guy gonna help us in the run game, can he help us with his feet? Can he do some things in the pass game? So there’s a lot more other factors.”

Finally, Harsin closed his quarterback talk by laughing at a question asked about how many mistakes has he seen from his quarterbacks on the field.

“There’s quite a few of those. We could be here all night if we wanna talk about that,” joked Harsin. “But let me just say this, every guy — from when they enter the huddle to when that play is called to when we get to the field — are we looking at the things we need to? The play clock. Are we moving the guys around and getting them where they need to, are we making some adjustments? Guy breaks the huddle and lines up and the tailback’s on the wrong side and doesn’t correct it. There’s an example, that’s not good.

“You leave the huddle and you come to the field and the tailbacks on the wrong side and he should be on the other side and you don’t correct it — that’s an opportunity to lead. That’s an opportunity for you as a quarterback to get things right. So those things happened. And you gotta be able to, you gotta know it. You gotta know your system.”