Bryan Harsin is a big believer in momentum and the role it can play on Saturdays. Unfortunately for the second-year Auburn coach, his team has a poor track record of generating it — and, conversely, keeping opponents from gathering some of their own — just before halftime.

In each of Auburn’s five games this season, opponents have scored a touchdown inside the final two minutes of the first half. In the last four games, those opponent touchdowns have either put Auburn behind heading into halftime, tied the game or — as was the case last weekend — trimmed the Tigers’ lead to a field goal at the break.

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“That’s a big one,” Harsin said. “That’s probably one of the biggest in my opinion, right? You don’t want anybody to score, and you want to score points going into halftime. I think it’s all about momentum. And that’s one area, when you’ve got the ball, it’s not just about scoring touchdowns, it’s just about scoring points, alright? Try to create some momentum, especially if you get the ball back in the second half…. So, being on the losing side of that, yeah, I mean that’s — you go in, they scored, alright, really that’s the momentum that they’ve got. And when you come into halftime, you’ve got to find a way to get that back.”

The problem for Auburn is that it largely has been unable to get those points back coming out of the locker room, as the team has struggled in the “middle eight” — the four minutes on either side of halftime, which often play critical roles in the outcome of any given game.

Auburn has been outscored 42-7 in the middle eight this season, and Harsin’s team has failed to win those crucial eight minutes in any game this year. Auburn has lost the middle eight in four of its five games, while it managed to come out even in that period of gametime in Week 2 against San Jose State (the Spartans scored a touchdown with 58 seconds left in the first half to take a 10-7 lead at the break, but the Tigers responded with a Tank Bigsby touchdown with 11:45 to go in the third to cap their opening drive coming out of the locker room).

It’s part of a troubling trend for Auburn under Harsin, which particularly struggled in the middle section of games against Power 5 competition last season. Auburn was outpaced, 59-13, in the middle eight of those nine games — eight SEC contests plus the Penn State game — and only held an advantage in that area once: in the Iron Bowl, outscoring Alabama 3-0 in that stretch before ultimately losing in a quadruple-overtime thriller.

Those issues have extended into this season, with Auburn outscored 28-0 in the middle sections of its last three games (its only games against Power 5 opponents so far).

Penn State held a 14-0 edge in that stretch during the Week 3 tilt at Jordan-Hare Stadium, including a Kaytron Allen rushing touchdown with 1:46 to go in the first half to extend the Nittany Lions’ lead to 14-6 at halftime. Missouri and LSU each managed a 7-0 advantage in that area; Missouri’s Brady Cook scored from 1 yard out with 30 seconds left in the first half to tie the game at 14-14, while LSU’s Jayden Daniels had a 1-yard touchdown run with 15 seconds remaining in the half, cutting Auburn’s lead to 17-14, as Harsin’s team eventually blew a 17-point lead in a 21-17 loss last weekend.

In 12 games under Harsin, Auburn has now been outscored 87-13 in that crucial period of games against Power 5 opponents.

“That’s a big factor, in my opinion, at halftime, giving up points or trying to get them,” Harsin said.

Auburn’s Middle 8 struggles in 2022:

Complicating the matter for Auburn has been the team’s well-documented second-half struggles under Harsin. In the Tigers’ last eight games against Power 5 teams, they have been outscored 104-21 in regulation after halftime. The team is 2-6 during that stretch, with wins against Ole Miss late last October and the fortunate overtime escape against Missouri two weeks ago.

Over the last three weeks, excluding the overtime period against Missouri, Auburn has managed just one second-half score — a fourth-quarter touchdown (followed by a failed two-point conversion) in a blowout loss to Penn State. Auburn has been outscored, 34-6, after halftime of those three games while averaging just 0.32 points per drive and committing five turnovers (along with three more turnovers on downs).

“We look at every game and we know the reasons, alright?” Harsin said. “We know the reasons. We look at every drive. There’s a drive chart. There’s a result. There’s reasons why, and so we break it all down. You know, what was it? Where did we have a negative play? Where did we have positive plays? What was the end result on those drives? So, those are things that we’ve discussed as a staff, those are things we discuss with our players.”

According to Harsin, the biggest issues have been consistency and negative plays. Auburn needs to find more of the former and cut down on the latter — which it hasn’t been able to do against quality competition.

“That’s play-calling, that’s execution; that’s all those things,” Harsin said. “I mean, it’s really not one thing in particular that’s just the glaring reason why. It’s things that we all have to improve on and get better at. And then our adjustments coming out of half, we’ve got to be able to find ways to continue to put points on the board.

“It’s not just the half of football; you’ve got to play all four quarters.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.