Countdown to Kickoff: How Does Auburn’s Byrum Brown Compare To Baylor’s DJ Lagway?

The Auburn Tigers are now just six days away from kickoff of their first game of the season, a Week 1 matchup with the Baylor Bears. Both teams are relying on first-year transfer quarterbacks for this upcoming season, with the Tigers leaning on Byrum Brown and the Bears trusting DJ Lagway with the starting spot.

Brown transferred to the Plains after four years at USF, following his head coach, Alex Golesh, who was hired for Auburn’s vacant head coaching role last November. Brown, a senior, earned the starting job with the Bulls back in 2023, and barring an injury in 2024, he has not let the spot go.

In four years with the Bulls, Brown has managed to accumulate 7,690 passing yards and 61 passing touchdowns on a career 64.9% completion rate, while tacking on 2,265 rushing yards and 31 rushing touchdowns for good measure. Last season, his best with the Bulls, Brown passed for 3,158 yards and rushed for an additional 1,008 yards, accounted for 42 touchdowns and only turned the ball over seven times.

Conversely, DJ Lagway, who transferred to Baylor after two seasons at Florida, is a junior who has only had two full years of experience in the college ranks, though he has the added advantage of spending all of that time in the SEC, where the competition is noticeably steeper than in the AAC, where Brown played.

Lagway has accounted for 4,179 passing yards and 23 passing touchdowns on 62% competition over two years with the Gators, adding 237 rushing yards and a lone rushing touchdown as well. Last season with the Gators, Lagway passed for 2,264 yards and 14 touchdowns, though he threw 11 interceptions.

Each quarterback seems to have one major question surrounding their play as they enter this season. For Brown, it is how a quarterback who smashed several records last year in the AAC will adjust to a grueling SEC schedule, and for Lagway, it is whether or not his consistent interception troubles continue into a new uniform in Waco.

Both of these teams, which are scheduled to play on Sept. 5, can, and likely will, live and die by their quarterback play, which is to say that the quarterback who has a stronger performance may be the deciding factor in this matchup as both teams look to establish an identity for the 2026 season.

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