The last two months have been a whirlwind for Auburn head coach Alex Golesh and his inaugural staff on the Plains, balancing roster retention, attacking the transfer portal and building relationships with high school recruits.
But now, it’s time for football – a welcoming change for Golesh.
“The part we’re giddy about is getting on the turf with our guys and getting to coach football,” Golesh said. “Everyone is like, ‘How are you doing?’ I get to coach football, finally. It’s exciting.”
After losing 37 players to the transfer portal, Auburn has largely – with the caveat of adding a few more names – completed its transfer haul with 40 newcomers.
With Golesh bringing in former USF assistants Joel Gordon as offensive coordinator, Kodi Burns as wide receivers coach and Tyler Hudanick as offensive line coach, the offensive side of the ball is built on familiarity and cohesion. Thirteen former Bulls will suit up in orange and blue next season, and 11 of them play offense.
Having the core of the staff together is something that Gordon called a “game-changer.”
“It’s hard to even quantify how much further ahead that we will be,” he said.
When Gordon arrived in South Florida three years ago, the only person he knew on staff was Golesh, making the transition from Iowa State far more difficult.
“That was a really important winter time and spring for me personally, but it was brand new to the players, brand new to the coaches. To walk through the door right now and to have players and coaches that have been doing it together for the last three years is huge. The amount of time that we are able to spend on other things, instead of teaching everybody how this thing works, is way ahead of schedule compared to three years ago.”
Obviously, headlining the group of transfers from USF is quarterback Byrum Brown, who threw for over 3,000 yards and ran for over 1,000 to become the 12th player in FBS history to do so in a single season.
Needing to replace all five starters along the offensive line, Hudanick brought over Cole Best and Cole Skinner to compete in a room that now features 20 players.
“To be able to bring the guys from South Florida will be huge. Cole Best, what he did for us in the last year-and-a-half, you can’t tell anybody how important that guy was to the culture,” Gordon said. “He and Skinner, those guys – and all the guys from South Florida – they’ve got to do a great job of leading.”
With Golesh’s goal this spring being to establish a foundation and evaluate what his team does best– and what it does not – having players who understand the culture, expectations and system is invaluable in Year 1.
“For those guys to say, ‘He’s got us, just trust him.’ That, I will tell you, is absolutely priceless,” Golesh said. As you go in, that proof of concept I continue to talk about, they’ve seen it. I’m not talking about scoring a bunch of points or any of that; that is what it is, and that’ll come, but more so, just the level of accountability that is required to play football here. The level of discipline that is required to play football here. The level of work ethic that’s required to play football here. The type of human being you have to be to play here.
“The time it takes to build trust and build relationships within a football program. I mean, that takes years, a lot of the time. These guys can accelerate it by saying, ‘Hey, stop it, trust him.’ When it’s one of your peers telling you that, it’s a lot easier to gain that trust. Obviously, we can’t break it then, but it definitely creates a level of trust that makes it a lot easier to then go ahead and teach from there.”
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