AUBURN, Alabama — Auburn knocked off two No. 1 teams inside Jordan-Hare Stadium in November.

CBS analyst Gary Danielson believes playing at home made Auburn a much better team than the one that played on the road earlier in the season. And that could be a problem for No. 2 Auburn (10-2) in the SEC Championship Game against No. 5 Georgia (11-1).

“Auburn has proved they're elite at home,” Danielson said Wednesday. “I don’t know if they’ve proved to me they’re elite away from Jordan-Hare (Stadium).”

Auburn’s two losses occurred on the road against teams ranked No. 1 (Clemson) and No. 17 (LSU) in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. The Tigers won their SEC games by an average of 28 points heading into the Iron Bowl, which they won 26-14 against then-No. 1 Alabama. All seven of Auburn’s SEC victories, including three on the road, were by double digits.

Auburn and Georgia meet again after the Tigers dominated the Bulldogs 40-17 inside Jordan-Hare Stadium on Nov. 11. Georgia was ranked No. 1 at the time and was undefeated.

“For (Georgia quarterback) Jake (Fromm), that big game in Jordan-Hare was really valuable,” Danielson said. “If you play a game on the road like that, a big game like that, and let’s say you’re Aaron Murray in Year 4 and you play on the road, that helps in your experience ,but when you’re in your freshman year, that’s huge. That may be 50 percent of all your experience in a big game. He’s going to watch the tape and see opportunities were available to him and I think (offensive coordinator) Jim Chaney is known as an expert play caller and has an ability to break down a defense. I would assume Jake will be a much more comfortable quarterback in realizing plays where there — and with a half second there or a half second there, the game could have changed early and maybe it was a different outcome.

Danielson and CBS play-by-play man Brad Nessler mostly pointed to the mistakes Georgia made in the first game with Auburn rather than the Tigers’ dominance n the game.

“I don’t think Alabama and Georgia could have played any worse than they played against Auburn,” Nessler said. “And I’m not sure Auburn can play any better than they did against Georgia and Alabama. From a rematch standpoint, I don’t think it’s the Georgia people going, ‘Oh, man, we got beat by 23.’ I think they’re, ‘Hey, we’ve got another crack at them. We were a better team we thought going in had it not been at Jordan-Hare, had it been in Athens, it might have been a different story.’ I’m only looking at it from the Georgia side. Auburn, they just wanted to keep winning to get to this point and they did a marvelous job to beat two No. 1s in a three-week span to do it. I don’t think anybody wants to play Auburn right now, but I think Georgia does. If Auburn makes the playoffs, I don’t think anybody wants a piece of them, but I think Georgia does.”

Auburn held Georgia star running backs Nick Chubb and Sony Michel to a combined 46 rushing yards, a season-low for the duo.

“I don’t think anybody could have handled that beatdown better than (Georgia coach) Kirby (Smart) handled it, especially with Gus (Malzahn) saying we beat the dog out of them,” Malzahn said. “Kirby basically looked at his team and said, I’m not mad because he’s right. They did beat the dog out of you. They did it on national television and if you don’t buckle up and get more disciplined and toughen up, they’re gonna beat the dog out of you on national television again. I thought he was brilliant in the way he handled that to get his team pointed for this football game.

“But the problem is that’s all great. But if the Georgia offensive line can not handle the Auburn defensive line the same issues might start to pop up. … It looked to me like [Alabama] felt they couldn’t block them and they tried to finesse them and I think Georgia can have the same problems. That’s why I’m looking forward to watching the game. Nobody has the answers to it. There’s no strategy for a defensive line you can’t block.”

The key for Auburn is the health of running back Kerryon Johnson. He injured his shoulder late in the Iron Bowl and his status for the SEC Championship Game is up in the air after rushing for 100 yards in eight of 10 games this season. He rushed for 167 yards and caught a touchdown pass against the Bulldogs earlier this season.

"I don’t think Georgia can win if Kerryon Johnson runs the way he did last time because it opens up the rest of the offense and it goes right into the sweet spot of Chip and Gus calling their offense," Danielson said.

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