The Auburn football team were dead men walking in Baton Rouge on Saturday night against No. 22 LSU.

After LSU’s offense shot 75 yards down the field in just four plays and took an early 7-0 lead against Auburn, Payton Thorne and the Auburn offense got off to a start that would’ve been deemed disastrous anywhere – but certainly in a place like LSU’s Death Valley.

Auburn’s first play from scrimmage didn’t even get off before it was whistled for a false start.

Despite playing behind the sticks, Auburn managed to get itself into a third-and-manageable situation, only for an errant snap to go ricocheting off Thorne’s unexpecting hands for a loss of 12 yards, forcing Auburn to punt it away.

“We looked like zombies a bit on the sideline after that,” Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze said on Monday.

And though it’s said to never rain at LSU’s Tiger Stadium, meaning snow would be hard to come by, it didn’t stop Auburn’s lack of effort, intensity and passion from snowballing out of control on Saturday night.

As game clock continued to expire and the game’s end neared, Freeze wore his emotions on his sleeve.

Freeze will tell you he wasn’t angry in the final moments of Saturday’s game as he’s not sure “anger is the right response”. And because he “understands this game”, Freeze wasn’t heartbroken at Saturday’s result either.

“I certainly wasn’t happy. Whether you call it sad, angry, or whatever, I was definitely not happy,” Freeze said. “It’s disappointing for sure, not to compete any better than we did.”

Auburn lost to No. 22 LSU 48-18 on Saturday night, keeping Freeze and the Tigers from winning their first conference game of the season and dropping Auburn to 3-3 on the year with its three losses coming in order.

The 48 points Jayden Daniels and the LSU offense dropped was the most Auburn had ever allowed against the Bayou Bengals.

It was a failure on all accounts for Auburn.

“They played harder, which is embarrassing and hurtful to say,” Freeze said of LSU on Monday. “It’s one thing for a team to have more talent, but I didn’t think we showed up with the right energy and drive and competitive spirit, and that lies in my lap.”

Hearing Freeze take responsibility for the intangibles Auburn lacked against LSU should be well-received by Auburn fans – especially on the heels of a former coaching staff that maybe didn’t take long looks in the mirror when it needed to.

But because Freeze can’t throw on an Auburn jersey on Saturdays, him taking accountability only helps if paired with his players taking accountability – and that only happens if Saturday’s showing digs at Auburn’s players the same way it dug at Freeze towards the end of Saturday’s game.

In the case of senior linebacker Wesley Steiner, Saturday was maddening.

“It was embarrassing to watch. I was slightly disappointed with our response to being down,” Steiner said. “It was righteous indignation.”

Fortunately for Auburn, it sounds like Freeze might’ve given the team an earful.

Veteran cornerback Nehemiah Pritchett told reporters Tuesday that Freeze “definitely harped on” Auburn’s lack of effort against LSU.

Meanwhile, freshman defensive end Keldric Faulk — who started his first game for Auburn against LSU — said it was one of the first thing players on defense addressed in their group text chain.

“We just said that we need to practice like we are champions,” Faulk told reporters Tuesday. “We need to come in and practice like we can go out there and win these games.”

In comparison to the practices leading up to the Georgia game on Sept. 30, Faulk said the defense was buzzing with energy and flying to the ball. But after the bye week and during the week of preparing for LSU, “it kinda went flat,” Faulk said.

But talking about a fix only does so much without action.

“We’re trying to get that energy back,” Faulk said.

And that starts during practice on Tuesday.

“(Coach Freeze) said we’ve gotta bring more intensity on the sidelines,” Auburn tight end Rivaldo Fairweather said. “So we’re gonna try to make sure we do that today in practice.”

Fortunately for Auburn, while it works to iron out the wrinkles it has in the morale department, playing back at Jordan-Hare Stadium this week is bound to help.

“We were away, so we didn’t have the home advantage this time so it kinda brought people down just seeing the crowd cheer for other people on the other team,” Fairweather said. “But we’re back at home this week, so we’re going to be good and we’re going to bring the intensity.”

But that’s only a temporary fix to a problem that can quickly snowball out of control – much like it did in Baton Rouge – and cause long-term side effects.

“You don’t want to have to — every time you lose a game — ask what we’re going to do to finish the year,” Freeze said.

“Hopefully, we have enough players that lead well enough that we see another opportunity to represent each other and our university and another step toward hopefully getting better as program, but how we prepare this week will show on Saturday. It always does, and that will be the message.”