When D.J. James hauled in an errant Cal 4th down pass into the endzone with fewer than two minutes to go, when he celebrated as he strutted down the sideline, when this silly and odd football game finally reached James’ win-sealing play, Auburn’s defense could finally rest. Its job, at last, had come to a close.

So when James sat down in the visiting team interview room with a seatbelt draped around his neck. It’s the same seatbelt safety Jaylin Simpson wore in his interview a week prior after his interception return for a touchdown against UMass.

“It’s amazing,” James said. “I’m put in those circumstances at practice so it was just like at practice. We compete with each other and we’re ready for it in the game.”

This is Auburn’s version of the turnover chain this season. Get a turnover? Wear the seatbelt. It is the literal manifestation of the celebration Auburn’s secondary uses to mimic strapping into a car.

And James was fitting to wear it after his interception to seal the game. It was the final time that Auburn’s defense did more than its part to bail out an offense that had one good drive the whole game and didn’t complete a pass for more than a quarter. Somehow, it pushed Auburn to a 14-10 win.

“Defense was constantly, ‘Coach, we got you. We got you. We’ll get you another stop,” Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze said. “That’s what it takes to be a really good football team. We’re a long way from being a great football team — compared to some elite — but we found a way to win, and we can grow from that. I think that’s what this season’s really about: us finding a way to grow and get better each week. I know we got better defensively tonight; we took a step back offensively.”

After a week against UMass where run defense struggled and a week where Cal running back Jaydn Ott called out the Auburn defense as something he could take advantage of, it was that same defense that time and time again picked up for an offense that gave almost zero help.

Cal’s offense kept coming, and sometimes it took a bit of luck, but Auburn’s defense kept coming through. Somehow.

The difficult situations Auburn’s offense left for defensive coordinator Ron Roberts’ group started from the very first drive of the game. On the first third down for Auburn’s offense, quarterback Payton Throne scrambled to his right, and appeared to step out of bounds, but fumbled before he went out, giving the ball to Cal. Cal picked up at the Auburn 35-yard line and only got three points out of it.

On the next drive, after Thorne was almost sacked in the endzone for a safety, Cal got the ball back at the Auburn 33-yard line and allowed nothing after causing enough pressure on the eventual field goal kick to cause a miss.

“That was tremendous momentum,” defensive tackle Marcus Harris said. “That gave the defense hope that we can keep going after the kick, keep trying to block it. We know that they didn’t have a pretty good kicker so we tried to give our all on field goal and I think it worked for us.”

Cal had four drives that started on the Auburn half of the field, all four of which came off of some sort of Auburn offensive blunder, and only allowed 10 points. In a game where Auburn only had 94 passing yards. It lost the turnover battle — committing four of the game’s seven, yes seven, turnovers — and still won the game.

That’s because Auburn’s defense came up incredibly clutch when it desperately needed to. It forced three turnovers of its own.

“Cause we know Coach Roberts and Coach Montgomery and Coach Freeze, we know it’s going to hit at some point,” Harris said. “We just know we gotta keep going, keep going, keep going. We just trust our offense will have our back. When you got a coach like Coach Freeze, you know he’s gonna have our back so we wanted to just keep going for him.”

There was Donovan Kaufman forcing a fumble in the second quarter which set up Auburn’s offense with just 17 yards to go. That ensuing drive would bring Auburn’s only touchdown in the first half.

Kaufman would leave the game with Freeze described as a head injury which will require concussion tests.

There was Marcus Harris picking up a crucial sack on a third down with Cal in Auburn’s red zone. There was Larry Nixon III with a crucial third down run stop late in the fourth quarter. Jaylin Simpson had an interception on a UMass Hail Mary pass attempted before halftime.

Auburn’s special teams pressure was one factor that appeared to lead to difficult situations for Cal kicker Michael Luckhurst. He missed three field goals and made one 51-yard-field goal that was called back because of a penalty and Cal attempted the Hail Mary instead. That makes 12 points Cal could have had that Auburn’s defense had a role in preventing.

For every poor field position given or lack of rest coming Auburn’s chore of an offense against Cal, the defense bent but didn’t break. That’s exactly what Auburn needed.

“I think the biggest thing is in the midst of chaos, there’s opportunity,” linebacker Eugene Asante said. “Everybody sees this chaotic scene, but there’s an opportunity to put water to the fire and cover our brother’s backs. We are our brother’s keeper. That’s the biggest thing, just not being frustrated. Not being disappointed. But just going out there with a positive mindset and just playing play after play.”

Right, then there was Eugene Asante. Plain and simple, Auburn wouldn’t have won this game if not for him.

Asante led Auburn with 12 total tackles. He had 1.5 tackles for loss, a sack, a pass breakup and two QB hits. He was stellar and willed the defense to keep going every single time.

“What a night he had,” Freeze said of Asante.

His plays were timely, too. He had five stops on third downs. Two of those stops led to missed field goals. Maybe the most important stop was a third-down sack of Cal quarterback Sam Jackson V in the fourth quarter, which led to the final of the three missed field goals.

He was Auburn’s most valuable player, both for his vocal leadership and on-field play. Asante has led Auburn in tackles for two straight games, and quickly filled a huge void for an Auburn defense without Austin Keys for the foreseeable future.

“It was a big thing for me because I played on scout team last year,” Asante said. “That kind of thing fuels me, just being out there. Coach Roberts, coach Aldridge, this staff giving me the opportunity to show what I can do, I’m just forever grateful to them.”

Auburn’s defense was challenged. It rose up to it and them some. When a play needed to be made, Asante and the defense got it done. They just kept going and going. Cal had the ball for nearly 10 more minutes than Auburn but the defensive pressure never let up.

This was truly an effort that bailed out Auburn.

So now Asante too, can rest. So he yelled, “Sleep time!” as he walked out of the interview room and to the team bus to the airport.

Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at [email protected]