Auburn football head coach Bryan Harsin is a man that rewards those that do the right thing, but he also won’t hold his tongue when something isn’t satisfactory within his program.
The 2021 Tigers, his first squad on the Plains, learned the hard way in catching flak from the Boise native for the fashion in which last season ended.
As great of an effort as that team showed week in and week out, it was clear by season’s end that something beyond the level of talent on the field is the reason why games were being lost. Auburn was competitive in every game outside–minus the Georgia and Texas A&M outings–but couldn’t buy a win late in the season.
Harsin seemingly called out the 2021 Auburn football roster in juxtaposing this year’s team to that one:
"“We didn’t like the way we finished; nobody did,” Harsin said. “That’s the key; if you’re going to make a run, you’re going to play for something at the end of the year, you have to finish…. We’ve got to take what we learned from that and apply it to what we’re doing moving forward.If you’re trying to get further, and you’re trying to move along and improve and get there faster, then you need to have people that will actually follow,” Harsin said. “… I think we’re in a better spot. There’s respect. And I think there’s trust. And I think the players, they really want to make progress.”"
The statement that stands out to Fly War Eagle is that you ‘need people that will actually follow’. We don’t read it as a shot to any particular player, but clearly Harsin is a fan of the personnel changes made this offseason across the board.
Let’s hope the current locker-room harmony translates to on-field success.