The Auburn Tigers were ranked No. 67 in the final CBS Sports 136 of the 2025 season. Ranked two spots ahead of them was their Week 1 opponent, the Baylor Bears, whom AU defeated 38-24 on their homefield.
Is there something wrong with this picture? No, actually.
While the Bears lost five of their last six games, they also owned a win over the SMU Mustangs, who finished 9-4. Auburn's best win was Baylor, unless you want to twist yourself into a pretzel and say it was the Bobby Petrino-coached Arkansas Razorbacks.
Of course, this is one's publication's view of how the season went. Given how the Tigers and Bears' season finished, it's easy to forget that Week 1 win.
What's not easy to forget is how disastrous this season was on the Plains.
2025 season pushed Auburn further into national disrespect
After all the unfathomable losing during the Bryan Harsin era, many Auburn fans were hoping to buy into a slow-moving process if it meant Hugh Freeze can have the program functioning like they should, especially considering the resources poured in and the general enthusiasm in East Central Alabama about the program.
What a load of...
Freeze ended up building his reputation as a great recruiter on the backs of the "Yellafella," Jimmy Rane, and the On To Victory NIL collective, not to mention simply picking up the phone to establish relationships with local high school coaches. He did the bare minimum, but that was seen as a win after Harsin stubbornly refused to even do that.
The sheer talent the Tigers possessed during the 2025 season should've vaulted this team to, at minimum, a six-win, bowl-eligible expectation. Freeze just needed to keep everyone bought into more than their NIL/rev-share payout.
Nope. Couldn't do that.
Auburn's 2025 season was likely more destructive to its reputation in the sport than the four that preceded it, which also ended with seven losses. The Tigers were supposed to not only be good, but also contend in the SEC, and occupy the spot the Ole Miss Rebels, Oklahoma Sooners, Alabama Crimson Tide, or Texas A&M Aggies ended up in. Instead, they were 5-7 and fired their coach midway through the season for the second time in four years.
Freeze will escape the scrutiny Harsin got, because he's from the region and was better at selling a false persona. But mainly because he's from the Deep South and that's how many in the region determine someone's character.
He was just as, if not more, destructive than Harsin, though, because he made it clear that even with elite talent, Auburn is still susceptible to false idols and JABA.
Clearly, the national media factored that into their end-of-season rankings. At least Harsin's Cal Golden Bears cracked the top 60.