AUBURN, Ala. — Auburn’s Demond Washington finally got to show off his burst as a kick returner Saturday night at Georgia when he ran 99 yards untouched for a score to momentarily tie the game in the fourth quarter.

Head coach Gene Chizik and his staff have seen that explosiveness in practice for a while.

“He’s one of the fastest kids on our football team without question,” Chizik said. “We’ve got to have a guy that can make a difference back there. He’s capable of doing that.”

Washington provided the much-needed spark to Auburn’s return game, finishing with 202 kickoff return yards to break the school’s single-game record.

The junior also handled punt returns in addition to his duties starting at safety in place of the injured Zac Etheridge.

“Overall, I’m really proud of the kid,” Chizik said. “He just kept working and working and working. Didn’t matter where we put him. He just wanted to play football.”

Chizik would like Washington to secure the ball a little longer, however. Washington let go of the ball right as he got to the goal line.

“I said, ‘Aw, man, I probably dropped it too early,’” Washington said. “Once I dropped it, I thought about it and I looked back, but I saw the ref with his hands up, so I said, ‘OK, that’s a touchdown.’”

Chizik was unsure whether Washington’s future on defense will be as a safety or his natural position, cornerback.

“Our safety position is a carousel,” Chizik said. “It’s a revolving door. I don’t know how that position is going to play out just health-wise with two or three of our guys. So if he has to go back there, we feel good about him doing that.

“We’d prefer him to be a corner because I think he was making great strides there but it’s obvious, with more practice, can be good at both.”

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• Linebacker Eltoro Freeman’s status for the Iron Bowl remains up in the air after the sophomore left the Georgia game early in the third quarter with an injury. “We’re going to have to play that one by ear,” Chizik said. Auburn’s radio announcers said during the game that Freeman suffered a concussion, but the weak-side linebacker was seen Sunday at the school’s athletic complex with a protective brace on his foot.

• The Tigers played well against the run before Freeman left. But Georgia finished with 169 rushing yards, 131 of which came in the second half. “I think when Eltoro went out, that certainly didn’t help our cause,” Chizik said. “That’s not an excuse at all, but for a good bit of that football game we were playing well against the run.”

• True freshman Jonathan Evans replaced him finished with four tackles and got in on a tackle for a loss. “For getting kind of abruptly thrown in there, I thought he did well,” Chizik said. “We had faith in Jonathan,” linebacker Craig Stevens said. “We talked to him on the sidelines and tried to help him get aligned and just calm down out there and play just like practice. He did OK out there. He’s not like Toro out there. Toro has a lot more experience than him out there.”

• Apparently Demond can predict the future. "Demond was telling us all night that he was going to take one to the house and all we needed to do was get our blocks," wide receiver Emory Blake said. "That's what I did. That's what everyone else did -- and we made a big play."

• Chizik has been pleased about his staff's recruiting efforts. Although he didn't mention them by name, two blue-chip offensive players committed to Auburn the last two weeks: five-star RB Michael Dyer and four-star WR Trovon Reed:. "It's really been neat," Chizik said. "I mean, all of the assistants have done a phenomenal job of going after the right fit guys, the guys that we think are the right fit for Auburn. They're all great players, but they're also in our opinion the right fit, the right kind of guys for this place. It's really neat to see the response nationwide wherever we go. Obviously, most of our concentration is in the Southeast of some sort, but that doesn't mean that's our only focus. But it's been neat, because they've all been very receptive to Auburn. Every one of them. And that's been a great thing to see."

• Chizik said Auburn hopes to get a left tackle recruit enrolled in school in January to help replace senior Andrew McCain next season.

• Quick fact: Auburn has allowed 297 points this year, the most in school history.

• Tight end Tommy Trott, like his teammates, is happy to get some rest with the bye this week. "The season definitely wears on you," Trott said. "It's been 11 weeks of playing ball now, or preparing to play ball, and then you add in two-a-days. You haven't had a break in what, 14, 15 weeks? People's legs are tired."

• Trott sees the Iron Bowl as an opportunity to do something special on a grand stage. "That's our rival," he said. "We'd love nothing more than to wreck an undefeated season, upset them when they're riding on their high horse and ranked No. 2 in the country. That'd be awesome. That's an exciting opportunity. That's easy to prepare for and it's going to be something special."

• Count Trott as one player who doesn’t mind the Iron Bowl being moved to the Friday after Thanksgiving. “All it means is that it’s probably going to draw an even bigger audience,” he said. “It’s going to be one of the only games that day. The whole country’s going to be watching.”

• Stevens is from Florida but quickly figured out how big the Iron Bowl was for this state. "Probably after the first game," he said. "I didn't know how serious it was. I'm used to Florida State and Florida and all those teams. Once I got out here I just figured it was just another rivalry. Once I got out here I saw how serious it was. Once you play in it one time, you see how serious the players, the coaches and the fans take it, so you start to develop it with you."

• A loss would go a long way in making this season seem like a success, players said. "You can always make up for any loss you have by winning this game," Stevens said. "No matter how the season goes, you win this game and it makes everything seem so much better. This game means a lot for the whole organization."

• Both Trott and Stevens ranked the Georgia loss among the toughest they've ever had. "You hate to lose a game like that where it's just fighting the whole game and in the end it just doesn't turn out the way you want it," Stevens said. "That's a tough one, man."

• Chizik sounds like he had a positive message for the team Saturday night despite the loss. Here's Trott's version of how it went: "We lost last night and Coach Chizik demanded everyone look him in the eyes and he said, 'I promise you, all you guys coming back, there will be better days here at Auburn. We're going to get it back the way it was.' And we've got a great coaching staff, we've got great things going on here. They're going to get back to where Auburn needs to be. These coaches are going to do it. We have some talent, young talent on this team. We have some depth issues right now that we're experiencing and even more as some players have been getting hurt recently. But this team has a future. This program has a future and it's a bright future. And I fully expect them to turn things around, and we plan on doing it this week against Alabama. There's no reason that we need to get things turned around next year. We're 7-4 right now. Obviously that's a couple of ballgames better than last year was and we're headed in the right direction. I mean, 8-4 and win against Alabama I think would have the Auburn fan base feeling real good about what this team did this year. It would turn this season into it was an all right season to a pretty good season for those guys."