The talent Auburn Tigers football coach Hugh Freeze has accumulated over the last few recruiting cycles has paid dividends, resulting in what 247 Sports' Nathan King deemed as good as Gus Malzahn's 2019 roster.
King even hinted that last year's team was essentially a seven or eight-win team that disguised itself as bad through careless untimely mistakes.
“You clean up a couple of those late-game issues, you clean up a couple of those, that’s probably good enough in and of itself for a couple more wins this season. So I think Auburn fans are very optimistic," King said on the Cover 3 podcast.
Auburn won nine games in 2019. It was the last time the Tigers were perceived as a national presence and not a punchline in-season.
Before the 2020 season, there was hope AU could be something. Bo Nix proved he can rise to the occasion after knocking off Alabama in the Iron Bowl, and incoming freshman Tank Bigsby looked like a potential superstar rusher in the SEC. Couple that with Kevin Steele's accumulation of top defensive talent over the years, and there was hope on the Plains.
The downgrade from Kenny Dillingham to Chad Morris was underestimated. The defense was porous at the wrong times against Texas A&M and, more egregiously, South Carolina, plus Arkansas nearly pulled off the upset at Jordan-Hare Stadium.
Things didn't go as planned in Malzahn's final years. And they certainly haven't since under Bryan Harsin and Freeze.
The stench from Harsin's tenure is mostly gone now. 2025 is on Freeze. Win football games and live to see 2026.
Freeze has the talent to do so. Falling short of the set expectations probably means interim head coach DJ Durkin and yet another head coaching buyout.