Auburn entered the 2007 season as the number 14 team according to the Coaches Poll and number 18 according to the AP Poll. The Tigers opened the season with a 23-13 win over the Kansas State of the Big12; however, in the two following weeks the Tigers were upset by the Big East’s South Florida and by division opponent Mississippi State. With a week 4 win over New Mexico State followed by three straight SEC wins versus then-#3 Florida, Vanderbilt and Arkansas, the 2007 Tigers continue to salvage their season. Following a tough loss at then-#4 LSU, Auburn dropped to #22 in the BCS rankings before beating Ole Miss and now have 3 remaining regular season games including match ups against rivals Georgia and Alabama.
Auburn entered the 2006 season as a consensus Top-5 team based in part on the return of key offensive starters including tailback Kenny Irons and quarterback Brandon Cox. The 2006 season marked head coach Tommy Tuberville’s eighth season with the Tigers. He was assisted by third-year offensive coordinator Al Borges and first-year defensive coordinator Will Muschamp. The Tigers finished the season second in the SEC Western Division behind the surprising Arkansas Razorbacks. With signature wins over the eventual BCS champion Florida Gators and the final-ranked #3 LSU Tigers, Auburn was the only team that could claim victories over two BCS and top five teams. The Tigers finished the regular season with a win over rival Alabama, garnering an invitation to play Nebraska in the 71st annual Cotton Bowl Classic on New Year’s Day. Auburn beat the Cornhuskers 17-14, finishing the season with an impressive 11–2 record which garnered the squad a #8 final poll ranking.
Auburn completed the 2004 football season with an unblemished 13–0 record winning the SEC championship, their first conference title since 1989 and their first outright title since 1987. However, this achievement was somewhat overshadowed by the Tigers being left out of the BCS championship game in deference to two other undefeated, higher ranked teams, USC and Oklahoma. The 2004 team was led by quarterback Jason Campbell, running backs Carnell Williams and Ronnie Brown, and cornerback Carlos Rogers, all subsequently drafted in the first round of the 2005 NFL Draft. The team hired a new offensive coordinator, Al Borges, who led the team to use a modified West Coast offense (which he calls the Gulf Coast offense) to maximize the use of both star running backs. It proved quite effective, as the 2004 squad scored the second most points in a season ever by an Auburn team (outscoring opponents 417-147).
The Auburn Tigers football team represents the Auburn University in college football as a member of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision, competing in the Western Division of the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The current head coach, Tommy Tuberville, has led the Tigers since 1999. Auburn’s Jordan-Hare Stadium has a capacity of 87,451, ranking as the ninth-largest on-campus stadium in the NCAA.
The Tigers played the first football game in the Deep South in 1892, with the program’s first bowl appearance coming the 1936 season in the sixth Bacardi Bowl played in Havana, Cuba. Former Auburn head coaches have included College Football Hall of Fame members John Heisman, Mike Donahue, Ralph “Shug” Jordan, and Pat Dye. As of 2006, AU Football has had 76 winning seasons, 33 bowl appearances, twenty-three 9+ win seasons, eleven undefeated seasons and ten conference championships. Auburn has played in the Southeastern Conference since its inception in 1933 and have won six SEC Conference Championships, and since the divisional realignment of the conference in 1992, six Western Division championships and three trips to the SEC Championship game. Auburn Tigers Merchandise is a hot commodity in Alabama.
The College Football Research Center lists Auburn as the 14th best college football program in history, with eight Auburn squads listed in Billingsley’s Top 200 Teams of All Time (1869-2006). The Associated Press poll statistics show Auburn with the 11th best national record of being ranked in the final AP Poll and 13th overall (ranked 462 times out of 957 polls since the poll began in 1936), with an average ranking of 10.93. Since the Coaches Poll first released a final poll in 1950, Auburn has 32 seasons where the team finished in the top 20 in both the AP and Coaches Polls.
Auburn has the 13th most wins in D-1A college football. In terms of winning percentage, Auburn ranks as the 8th most successful team in the past 25 years with a 71.9% win rate (214–82–5) and 10th over the last 50 years with 68.8% (387–172–10). Of the 47 current I-A football programs that been active since Auburn first fielded a team 115 years ago, Auburn ranks 11th in winning percentage over that period.
Two Auburn players, Pat Sullivan in 1971 and Bo Jackson in 1985, have won the Heisman Trophy. The Trophy’s namesake, John Heisman, coached at Auburn from 1895 until 1899. Auburn is the only school where Heisman coached (among others, Georgia Tech and Clemson) that has produced a Heisman Trophy winner.
There have been a total of seven Auburn teams that have been awarded some form of “National Champions” title. The NCAA’s website states that “the NCAA does not conduct a national championship in Division I-A football and is not involved in the selection process”, but goes on to state that “a number of polling organizations provide a final ranking of Division I-A football teams at the end of each season”. The NCAA website then lists four Auburn squads that have been named National Champions by at least one organization. Here is the complete list of the Auburn teams ranked No. 1 and some of the organizations that recognized them as National Champion:
1913 undefeated 8–0 team, 1914 undefeated 8–0–1 team, 1957 undefeated 10–0 team, 1958 undefeated 9–0–1 team, 1983 11–1 team, 1993 undefeated 11–0 team, 2004 undefeated 13–0 team
The AP Poll did not begin selecting a champion until 1936 nor the AFCA Coaches Poll until 1950, so many national champion titles previous to those date were awarded retroactively. However during the 1910’s, it is difficult to dispute the legitimacy of the Auburn titles. The undefeated 1913 and 1914 teams coached by Mike Donahue were some of the best defenses in Auburn history. In fact, the 1914 squad allowed zero points all season, outscoring opponents 193-0. The 1983 team featuring Bo Jackson went 11–1 and finished the season by beating Michigan 9-7 in the Sugar Bowl. The undefeated 2004 squad (13–0) finished second in the AP and Coaches Top 25 polls, but the team was awarded the 2004 Fanspoll.com People’s National Champion title. Auburn University officially only claims the Associated Press (AP) National Championship of 1957 (although the school does acknowledge the 1913, 1983, 1993 and 2004 titles in their media guide).
Auburn has two primary rivals, Alabama and Georgia. Alabama is the most heated rival and considered to be “the most intense intrastate college football rivalry in the country”. ESPNU ranked the rivalry #1 in their Top Ten College Football Rivalries. And in a survey done by Sports Illustrated the rivalry was ranked #2 after Boston Red Sox-New York Yankees as the greatest rivalry in all of sports history. The game is known as the Iron Bowl, with the first meeting coming in 1893. After a dispute in 1907 over where officials should be obtained, the teams did not play for over 40 years before a 1947 resolution by the Alabama House of Representatives encouraged the schools to “make possible the inauguration of a full athletic program between the two schools”. After a pair of meetings between the Auburn president Dr. Ralph B. Draughon and Alabama president Dr. John Gallalee, the two schools agreed to host the games at the “neutral” Legion Field in Birmingham (although the fact that Alabama played most of their ”
home” games at Legion Field before 1990 calls this neutrality into question), which continued until Auburn hosted the first on-campus meeting in 1989. Alabama holds the all-time edge at 38–32–1, although the Tigers have won the last five meetings and lead the series 15–11 since Pat Dye arrived at Auburn in 1981. Arguably the most famous Auburn victory in the rivalry is the 1972 victory by Auburn over the #2-ranked and heavily favored Alabama team. Auburn linebacker Bill Newton blocked two Alabama punts in the final ten minutes of the game which were both returned for touchdowns in near identical fashion by David Langner to give Auburn the 17-16 win in a game that became known as Punt Bama Punt.
Georgia and Auburn compete in the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry, dating back to 1892. The game was played in Piedmont Park in Atlanta, Georgia. The series is extremely close, with Auburn holding a 53–49–8 record. Auburn had only outscored Georgia by two points, before the 110th meeting that saw Georgia beat the Tigers 37-15. The matchup is one of the longest running and most played series in the NCAA.
Auburn also has a very competitive football rivalry with the LSU Tigers, see Auburn LSU rivalry; the last three games have been settled by eight total points. The two share more than just a nickname, as they have both enjoyed success in the SEC’s Western Division. Auburn or LSU have won at least a share of the SEC Western Division championship for the last six years. Auburn won it outright in 2000 and 2004, LSU tied Auburn and then went on to the SEC Title Game in 2001 and 2005. LSU also won the tiebreaker over Ole Miss in 2003 to go to the SEC Title game. The only time Auburn or LSU did not go to Atlanta since 2000 was when Arkansas won the three-way tie breaker with the two Tiger teams. Auburn won the 2006 clash 7-3 in a defensive battle at Jordan-Hare, and the 2007 meeting saw LSU win in Baton Rougue (the home team has won this game every year since 1999). While the series has no formal name, many of the games themselves have been named by the media such as the Earthquake Game in 1988, the Interception Game in 1994, The Whistle Game in 1995, the Barn Burner in 1996, Smoke ‘Em if You Got ‘Em in 1999, the Extra Point Game in 2004, the Doink Game in 2005, and the Interference Game in 2006. Since the teams began playing annually when the SEC split into separate divisions in 1992, Auburn is 9–7 versus LSU, although they still trail in the series overall 19–22–1 (but do hold the all-time points lead 616-575).
Before the Southeastern Conference expanded and split into Eastern and Western divisions, Auburn had annual rivalries with SEC East powers Florida and Tennessee. Since the split, Auburn only plays each of these two teams four times every ten years unless they meet in the SEC Championship game. The Tigers lead both teams all-time with a 42–38–2 edge over Florida and 25–21–3 series with Tennessee. Auburn also had a heated rivalry with Georgia Tech before Tech joined the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Tigers lead this series as well, 47–41–4.
Before each Auburn home football game, thousands of Auburn fans line Donahue Avenue to cheer on the team as they walk from Sewell Hall (the athletes’ dormitory) to Jordan-Hare Stadium. The tradition began in the 1960s when groups of kids would walk up the street to greet the team and get autographs. During the tenure of coach Doug Barfield, the coach urged fans to come out and support the team, and thousands did. Today the team, led by the coaches, walks down the hill and into the stadium surrounded by fans who pat them on the back and shake their hands as they walk. The largest Tiger Walk occurred on December 2, 1989, before the first ever home football game against rival Alabama—the Iron Bowl. On that day, an estimated 20,000 fans packed the one block section of road leading to the stadium. According to former athletic director David Housel, Tiger Walk has become “the most copied tradition in all of college football,” although there are older pre-game walks at Stanford and Williams College.
The intersection of Magnolia and College streets in Auburn, which marks the transition from downtown Auburn to the university campus, is known as Toomer’s Corner. It is named after Toomer’s Drugs, a small store on the corner that has been an Auburn landmark for over 150 years. Hanging over the corner are two massive old-growth oak trees, and anytime anything good happens concerning Auburn, toilet paper can usually be found hanging from the trees. Also known as “rolling the corner,” this tradition is thought to have originated in the 1950s and until the mid 1990s was relegated to only to celebrating athletic wins. However, in recent years it has become a way to celebrate anything good that happens concerning Auburn.
In April 2007, it was reported that the landmark trees at Toomer’s Corner are dying due to “years of abuse”. While it is difficult to determine how long the trees have left, plans are already being made to replace the historic tree with another live oak when the day comes.
There are many stories surrounding the origins of Auburn’s battle cry, “War Eagle.” The most popular account involves the first Auburn football game in 1892 between Auburn and the University of Georgia. According to the story, in the stands that day was an old Civil War soldier with an eagle that he had found injured on a battlefield and kept as a pet. The eagle broke free and began to soar over the field, and Auburn began to march toward the Georgia end-zone. The crowd began to chant, “War Eagle” as the eagle soared. After Auburn won the game, the eagle crashed to the field and died but, according to the legend, his spirit lives on every time an Auburn man or woman yells “War Eagle!” The battle cry of “War Eagle” also functions as a greeting for those associated with the University. For many years, a live golden eagle has embodied the spirit of this tradition. The eagle was once housed on campus in The Eagle’s Cage (which was the second largest single-bird enclosure in the country), but the aviary was taken down in 2003 and the eagle moved to a nearby raptor center. The eagle, War Eagle VI (nicknamed “Tiger”), is trained to fly around the stadium before every home game to the delight of fans.
The Wreck Tech Pajama Parade originated in 1896, when a group of mischievous Auburn ROTC cadets, determined to show up the more well-known engineers from Georgia Tech, snuck out of their dorms the night before the football game between Auburn and Tech and greased the railroad tracks. According to the story, the train carrying the Georgia Tech team slid through town and didn’t stop until it was halfway to the neighboring town of Loachapoka, Alabama, The Georgia Tech team was forced to walk the five miles back to Auburn and, not surprisingly, were rather weary at the end of their journey. This likely contributed to their 45–0 loss. While the railroad long ago ceased to be the way teams traveled to Auburn and students never greased the tracks again, the tradition continues in the form of a parade through downtown Auburn. Students parade through the streets in their pajamas and organizations build floats. This tradition has recently been renewed with Georgia Tech returning to Auburn’s schedule after nearly two decades of absence.
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.