Mailbag 204: How much does coordinator continuity matter?
This week: Transfer portal, Ashton Daniels, under-appreciated players, big men, departed Auburn restaurants and the Key/Ke-Shawns
AUBURN — Welcome back to the mailbag, now in its new offseason time slot.
As I wrote a while back, we’re going to try our best to spread out the stuff you get from us during the weekdays in the offseason. Since Dan and I record on Thursday nights, we’ll roll out our premium podcasts on Fridays. To avoid doubling up on emails, we’re pushing the mailbags back to Thursday mornings.
It’s all subject to change, though. You’ve got to be able to roll with the punches and adapt. That’s true in both college basketball and college football — and it’s also true in covering those two sports. Schedules will change. Stuff will happen. But it’s good to get into a routine for the next few months.
The mailbag is always a highlight of the offseason, as it’s a good way to keep us all sane while we wait for the start of a new season. If you’re new to this, you can always drop me a question at my email (the1andonlyJF@gmail.com) or send it to me on social media. We’ll try to do this each Thursday, with the occasional podcast ‘bag.
This week, in our return to the written format, you asked about Auburn football’s continuity at the coordinator spots, the transfer portals in both sports, under-appreciated athletes, roster management, restaurants I love and miss, and a whole lot more.
Thanks as always for joining us. Let’s have some fun this spring and summer, shall we?
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Let’s go.
Given that both coordinators are returning/in their second offseason (first time in how long?) have you noticed any changes in practice vs last year?
As in: This year, are they spending less time on scheme fundamentals/terminology, since there is more continuity in coaching staff?
Kevin
Even though Auburn football went 5-7 this past season, Hugh Freeze decided to keep both of his coordinators: Derrick Nix on offense and DJ Durkin on defense. There were rumors that Nix or Durkin could take new jobs this offseason, but they both stayed in place. Auburn actually gave Durkin a hefty raise with his new contract.
As we saw in Year 2, Freeze is going to stick to his guns and double down on his way That includes his staff. Nix is a former assistant of his and obviously someone he trusts to help run his preferred style of offense. Auburn’s offensive success or failure in 2025 will ultimately fall on Freeze’s shoulders, but it’s clear that he wanted continuity in that room heading into a make-or-break season.
Durkin had a top-20 defense in yards per play last season, and that came during a pretty large youth movement at several positions. Auburn’s third-down woes — it ranked No. 81 nationally in opponent conversions in games against power-conference opponents — were harmful, but one could argue that the defensive side of the ball was a year ahead of schedule, compared to the rest of Durkin’s resume.
This is the first time Auburn has brought back both its offensive and defensive coordinator in consecutive seasons since 2018. In 2017, the Tigers went to the SEC Championship Game with Chip Lindsey and the returning Kevin Steele. Auburn regressed from those 10-win heights a year later, but it still went 8-5.
The last time before that? Well, it was 2014, a year after Gus Malzahn led the Tigers to the BCS National Championship Game with Rhett Lashlee and Ellis Johnson in charge. Again, the Tigers regressed that season — and that one came with lofty preseason expectations — but they still finished… 8-5.
The time before that? After Gene Chizik’s first season featured the coordinator duo of Malzahn and Ted Roof in 2009, the gang stayed together for 2010. A space alien named Cam Newton crashed down and took the Tigers to a national title. In 2011, for a third straight year, Malzahn and Roof were the coordinators. The Tigers went… 8-5.
Before that? Jump back to 2007, as Auburn was fresh off an 11-2 season and brought back the duo of Al Borges and Will Muschamp. Again, there was regression from those double-digit wins, but Auburn still went… actually, this one was a 9-4 season.
And before that? The only other time it’s happened in this millennium was 2000 and 2001. Tommy Tuberville initially had Noel Mazzone as his offensive coordinator and John Lovett as his defensive coordinator. After going 5-6 in 1999, the Tigers went 9-4 and played in the SEC Championship Game. A year later, after bringing both back, they went 7-5.
So, this is an interesting spot for Auburn. The majority of the times it’s retained both coordinators, it was coming off of a strong season or was going from Year 1 to Year 2 of a tenure. This is a different situation, as the Tigers are trying to just get back to bowl eligibility after what has been now four straight seasons of below .500 football.
Unless retaining both coordinators at Auburn results in an automatic gravitational pull toward 8-5 — which would be improvement for this program right now — it’s hard to get a read on just how much this is going to benefit the Tigers.
Of course, it can’t hurt. Not having to hit the reset button when it came to terminology and knowledge of the systems was pretty important to Auburn this spring, if you go by what Freeze said.
“Verbiage is all the same, and the kids are more confident in it,” Freeze said last month. “You see that and feel it. So, now, it’s a matter of us executing those things at a high level, not about doing more. We’re talented enough at certain spots that I think less is more. And let’s execute those things very, very well.”
Auburn has had back-to-back strong recruiting classes, putting itself in a position to take a step forward. As Freeze said after the A-Day practice, the Tigers “should compete this year.” They won’t be changing schemes, and they had little staff turnover, outside of some position coaches who got promotions elsewhere. This is what Auburn has built itself towards over the last few years.
Freeze and his team just have to show that all of that actually matters when it matters the most: A dozen weekends in the fall, not in the hype of the spring and the summer.
Do you anticipate any significant football portal activity in the next couple of weeks? You know, it’s that greener pastures thing.
Ed