Can Hugh Freeze stop waffling and start winning at Auburn?
By Kevin Scarbinsky | Special to AL.comThis is an opinion column.
It was not Bryan Harsin. Not even close. It was not Doug Barfield. He’s not in the discussion.
The worst first season by a head coach in Auburn football history was not authored by Harsin, the program’s most incomprehensible hire, or by Barfied, a good man and good coach who had the misfortune to succeed the legendary Shug Jordan while Alabama was enjoying Bear Bryant’s final hurrah.
At the moment, at a school known for first-year magic - or at least encouragement - the competition for that dubious distinction of most dispiriting debut belongs to Earl Brown. In Brown’s first season as head coach in 1948, Auburn went 1-8-1 overall and 0-7 in the SEC. The Tigers lost their final eight games, including a 55-0 shutout loss to Alabama in the renewal of what Jordan would later christen the Iron Bowl.
Honorable mention on this list goes to George Bohler, whose 1928 arrival on the Plains left a 1-8 mark with seven shutout losses.
It’s impossible for Hugh Freeze’s first year to go lower in terms of overall record with three non-conference wins already in the bank, but at 0-4 halfway through the conference season, historic levels of Auburn family frustration are not yet out of the question.
The schedule does turn drastically in Auburn’s favor starting this week with Mississippi State at home, followed by road trips to Vanderbilt and Arkansas and a planned pre-Iron Bowl breather against New Mexico State.
Mississippi State has one SEC victory to date, but the Bulldogs have won two straight in this series. The Commodores and Razorbacks have zero conference wins between them this year, but at Ole Miss, Freeze suffered multiple defeats against both. The Aggies are 5-3 overall and 3-1 in Conference USA, with former UAB interim head coach Bryant Vincent doing good work as the team’s offensive coordinator, but c’mon. It’s C-USA minus UAB.
In most seasons in Auburn history, that would be a four-game winning streak waiting to happen, an oasis after a month-long trek through the desert, but this season is unlike most seasons that preceded it, just as Freeze is unlike most Auburn coaches that came before.
His first season has been marked by rare levels of press-conference honesty along with game-day uncertainty and futility. The would-be double pass in Saturday’s home loss to Ole Miss stands out as the defining blooper of the season to date.
Even Harsin’s first team in 2021, beset by the recruiting dropoff that marked the latter stages of Gus Malzahn’s tenure, did encouraging things on the field. Like giving Auburn its first win at LSU since 1999. Beating two ranked teams in Arkansas and Ole Miss, And, despite facing Alabama without the injured Bo Nix, leading the Iron Bowl most of the way until the final minute.
What has been encouraging about this Auburn season? An undermanned defense undercut by injuries has brought the fight each week and put the Tigers in position to beat both Georgia and Ole Miss in the second half. Otherwise, it’s hard to find a silver lining.
The last time Auburn started 0-4 in conference play, it finished 0-8 and dismissed Gene Chizik at the conclusion of the 2012 season. No one but the most anti-Freeze critic would suggest that this team will finish the season winless in the conference, but given the head coach’s inability through seven games to figure out the quarterback position, the play-calling, the offense in general and the right balance between game-day coaching and in-person recruiting, anything is possible.
Freeze’s repeated and reasonable negativity about the quality of his current roster against the likes of Texas A&M, Georgia, LSU and Ole Miss stops now. You can’t cede that ground to Mississippi State, Vanderbilt and Arkansas with any credibility.
Anything less than a four-game winning streak heading into the Iron Bowl will turn up the volume on the boos that filled the Jordan-Hare air Saturday night. It’s time for Freeze to stop waffling, stop emphasizing the talent this team does not possess and start winning.
Every Auburn coach since Earl Brown and his winless first trip through the SEC in 1948 has won at least two conference games in his debut season. There is no reason Freeze should not do the same.
