After the Auburn Tigers football team's terrible performance at home against the Kentucky Wildcats, the program announced it would be parting ways with Hugh Freeze. Though the next hire for the Tigers will not be made until the season is over, it is now technically the second week of the coaching search.
Freeze is the second failed hire after the end of the Gus Malzahn era, though Freeze's tenure on the Plains was drastically more productive than Bryan Harsin's. Still, Auburn football fans will have witnessed their fifth losing season in a row if the Tigers don't beat both Mercer and Alabama.
Many have shared thoughts on what Auburn football needs to get back to being a successful program, and former star quarterback Cam Newton weighed in with his criteria on a recent episode of his podcast.
“Number one, find you somebody who can recruit,” Newton said, per AL.com. “You can’t go to the Kentucky Derby with donkeys. Need a stallion...
“Number two, I’m gonna tell you who else you need. You need to find somebody that other coaches respect, and he can assemble his coaching staff accordingly...
“Last but not least, you need to hire a coach that understands the SEC, man. You gotta win yesterday, coach. We ain’t got time for you to develop a way of going about it. You ain’t got time to introduce your culture. You ain’t got time for a fan base that’s been fiending for some type of something, for you to say, ‘It’s gonna take time.’”
Newton went on to reiterate that Auburn is long overdue to find success in its football program again and that he, along with the rest of the fans, is ready for a program that wins.