Whether Alex Golesh was a great hire for Auburn or not will be played out during the next few seasons as he tries to build the Tigers into a SEC and national title contender again, following one of the worst five-season stretches in program history.
While the 41-year-old Golesh isn’t considered a home-run hire in the same category as Lane Kiffin at LSU, there are many people in the business who consider the new Auburn coach to be one of the brightest young offensive minds in the game.
Over at ESPN, Bill Connelly took a stab at ranking the hires during this year’s cycle, with only Kiffin getting an A+. When it comes to Auburn’s hiring of Golesh, the ESPN writer wasn’t so kind, grading it as either an A- or B+.
“Golesh inherited a program that had gone just 8-37 over the previous four seasons, and he immediately went 7-6 twice, then finished his run with a 9-3 team that was just six points away from 11-1. We'll see whether he can craft advantages from heavy tempo in a conference that has already seen plenty of it from Josh Heupel's Tennessee and Lane Kiffin's Ole Miss, but if you can win nine games at USF, you can win nine games at Auburn.”
Interestingly, Connelly has Golesh’s hiring behind Colorado State’s hiring of Jim Mora, Florida's getting Jon Sumrall, and Oklahoma State's hiring Eric Morris. While those hires might work out, there is no possible way that they should be ranked above Golesh, who led USF to a 9-3 record this season.