Jaylin Simpson walked down the northeastern tunnel of Nissan Stadium wearing his white Auburn uniform pulled over a navy blue sweatshirt. In a beanie, sweatpants and sneakers, he wasn’t going to play in the Music City Bowl against Maryland. The reason for his absence wasn’t clear — whether it be injury or opt-out — but it meant Simpson had played his last game for the Tigers.

So on a day that would be far more about those who are listed behind him on the depth chart, Simpson wore several chains displaying his teammates’ nicknames or numbers. He wore one that read “TLove” for freshman safety Terrance Love set to get the most playing time of his career or another showing a zero with a line through it for cornerback Keionte Scott among a handful of others.

Simpson’s absence meant Auburn would be down three of its four typical defensive back starters in an eventual 31-13 loss to Maryland. Cornerbacks DJ James and Nehemiah Pritchett both had announced plans to opt out of the Music City Bowl weeks before kickoff in preparation for the NFL Draft. It was rumored fellow starting safety Zion Puckett might not play either, but he did wind up on the field.

The expected losses in the secondary plus not having star defensive tackle Marcus Harris up front is why head coach Hugh Freeze said it would be an afternoon for “Keionte and the kids” during his appearance on Auburn’s Tiger Talk radio show.

Turns out, it would be Keionte, Zion Puckett and the kids, but Freeze’s point remained the same.

“On the back end, we’re going to see some new faces, I think they’re very talented faces,” defensive coordinator Ron Roberts said hardly 24 hours before kickoff. “These are guys that are the future of Auburn football, and I think have very bright futures. It’s been a fun experience to watch them go in there and get better the last ten days of practice.”

Auburn’s reshaped secondary started Scott and freshman Kayin Lee as its two outside cornerbacks. Scott had previously announced plans he would move to an outside position. Donovan Kaufman, who started in Scott’s place when he was injured during the 2023 season, started as the nickel corner. Puckett was in his traditional safety position while sophomore Caleb Wooden was the starting safety opposite him.

That group was tested immediately, and didn’t hold up.

Maryland passed for 158 yards in the fourth quarter and scored 21 points. Several players in Auburn’s secondary were burned for big gains and concerns Freeze had mentioned over potential for tackling struggles because of such an inexperienced group proved to be ominous.

It was not hard to tell this was a group that hadn’t played much, and that included Scott starting in a different position for the first time at Auburn.

“I know we were playing some young kids, but really thought we would start faster and could catch up with these guys,” Freeze said after the loss. “They hit us in a big screen on the first drive, and everything just kind of snowballed. But we had a ton of misalignments and miscommunications right in the early part of the game that really cost us. We’ve got to look at ourselves as coaches first to see why we weren’t more effective in getting those things communicated with our kids.”

But as the game progressed, the defense settled in and gave Auburn’s offense a chance to get back into the game. A chance the offense did not take advantage of.

Despite giving up 226 yards of offense in the first quarter, the Auburn defense only allowed 84 yards to Maryland for the entire rest of the game. Granted, of course, the result of the game was largely in hand for nearly the entirety of the second half. But it still showed a game of improvement defensively.

And that came as Auburn rotated in a significant number of inexperienced faces. Against Maryland, 28 Auburn defenders saw the field. Of those 28, 10 were freshmen or sophomores. Several upperclassmen who had not seen the field much at all this year got meaningful snaps against Maryland, too.

Wooden, a sophomore, led Auburn’s defense with 46 snaps out of 59 total plays. He was also Auburn’s highest-graded defensive player per Pro Football Focus. And while no Auburn players outside of Wooden graded particularly highly, young and inexperienced players including DJ Reed, Kayin Lee, Sylvester Smith, Bobby Jamison-Travis, Powell Gordon and Garrison Walker were all among Auburn’s top 12 rated players.

Of Auburn’s four pass breakups, freshmen accounted for two of them. The freshmen and sophomores accounted for half of Auburn’s six tackles for loss.

But with so many new faces, how did the defensive performance actually get better? Auburn players saw the communication improve.

“(DJ Reed) came in, of course he was asking questions of what he was supposed to do (and) how he was supposed to sit, but overall his communication was really outstanding,” freshman defensive end Keldric Faulk said. “And then I’m on the sideline, our freshmen DBs, communicate so well like they’ve been together for years. That’s really what it’s about, really for them to bond together and really just mold. Because next year it’s going to be them, they’re going to have to take that big of a role and come out there and play ball.”

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