While Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze noted at the very end of his press conference Monday that they were not the only reasons Auburn lost, two plays in the final five minutes of Saturday’s Iron Bowl proved paramount in Alabama’s eventual 27-24 escape from Jordan-Hare Stadium: a muffed punt and the fourth-and-goal conversion from 31 yards out.

After Auburn’s defense had seemed to get a stop with about five minutes left in the fourth quarter, Alabama got the ball back after wide receiver Koy Moore muffed the ensuing punt.

In the initial moment as well as the aftermath of the game, there was confusion about who was actually out there catching the punt. Normally, cornerback Keionte Scott should have been there. Scott and Moore both wear No. 0. The game’s official stats incorrectly listed Scott as the punt returner on that play. Freeze didn’t seem to realize Moore was the one back there until reporters said so after the game.

In his post game press conference, Freeze said he’d have to confer with his special teams staff to see what happened.

Turns out, Freeze said during his press conference Monday, Scott was hurt. But Moore had returned punts before, and in hindsight, Freeze still wasn’t worried about having Moore out there.

“Keionte dings his shoulder on third down, goes to the training room, so you put your backup in, which Koy has been solid all year at doing that,” Freeze said Monday. “I didn’t know that in the moment, but you have to play backups sometimes. The last thing you want to do in that moment is let them pin us back on the 5-yard line with their three timeouts. Koy has been solid all year at catching punts. Something happened with his footing it looked like there. It’s one of those awful plays that I think we win the game if we catch that punt. But Koy has been as dependable as can be. There’s really no discussion there. I mean, if Keionte is out then you put your next guy in there. We trust Koy to do his job, and he’s done it well all year. Unfortunately, he just had a bad break there.”

Regardless, Alabama picked up the fumble and it lead to an eventual fourth-and-goal play that will live in Iron Bowl lore as quarterback Jalen Milroe found receiver Isaiah Bond in the corner of the endzone for the game winning score.

Auburn dropped eight defensive backs into the endzone as coverage, left one defender as a spy on Milroe and only had two players pass rushing — essentially ineffective against five Alabama offensive linemen.

Freeze caught heat for not rushing more after Milroe, or not dropping the spy back in coverage to have nine guys in the endzone. It didn’t matter if Milroe scrambled, some thought, because Alabama had to get all 31 yards and score a touchdown on that play or the game was over.

Ultimately, Bond was able to get a one-on-one matchup with cornerback DJ James and Bond made the play.

Freeze defended his decision. Here’s how he explained Auburn’s defensive choice and alignment:

“We had a lot of discussion on that. They had a timeout and then we saw what they were in. They were in empty, so your choices are: Do we rush him? And if you do, we haven’t really got him on the ground very much, and he can scramble around, and you’re going to have a bunch of one-on-ones back there. You could do that, and one of their guys goes up and makes a play. Or you can drop everybody, and play 5-under, 3-deep and just play vision on the ball, knock the ball down because it has to go in the end zone. That’s the choice we made. I can show you still shots. I’ve taken pictures of every still shot from the 10-yard line in, and. I mean, we are in perfect position. We’ve got three over two. So either we didn’t coach it well enough, or we didn’t execute it well enough, and it’s probably a combination of both. It’s something we work every Thursday. That was our two options, and that’s the one we went with and felt like we could stay with their empty set and stay three over two, four over three and play with vision on the ball and knock the ball down. We didn’t play with vision on the ball.”

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