Making the jump from high school to college football is a major one and, for many reasons, Bo Nix handled it well as a freshman as Auburn’s starting quarterback in 2019.
Now, new offensive coordinator Chad Morris is hoping to help Nix take his game to another level.
“I have challenged him in this offseason to see if we can’t make the game slow down even more than what it did towards the end of last year,’ Morris said. “All of the great quarterbacks I have coached, that is one of the big characteristics and traits that they have was that the game slowed down. They anticipated the throws. They anticipated the windows coming open.”
In 2019, Nix threw for 2,542 yards and 16 touchdowns to just six interceptions while also rushing for seven more scores. At home, he threw no interceptions but struggled at times with his accuracy, completing just 57.6% of his pass attempts.
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Morris has seen improvement from the quarterback this fall.
“I think he has done a good job with in 12 practices,” Morris said. “It goes back to the communication and dialogue we have back and forth. I ask him every day after practice, ‘What did you see today?’ He is really beginning to see it well. It looks like the game is slowing down for him.
“Now what we have got to do is we have put so much install in over the 12 or 13 practices that we have had, we will eventually start narrowing things down, but I?have been pleased with him. Bo is like a coach on the field. When things break down Bo is usually really good when those things happen. He is able to make plays with his feet.
“I have been pleased with him and we have a long way to go. I asked him when I first got here, ‘Do you want to be good or do you want to be great?’ Obviously he said he wants to be great. He wants to be one of the best that has ever played. I said, ‘Okay, it is going to take a lot of work and I am going to remind you of this many days when I?am chewing on you pretty good.’ He has done a good job to this point. We have a long way to go.”