This is an opinion column.

There may be hope for Auburn yet. Not on the football field, where this helpless season and the hopeless tenure of an overmatched coach can’t end soon enough, but behind closed doors, where decisions that shape the future are made.

As AL.com has reported, it appears that Auburn is one step closer to saying good riddance to Bryan Harsin and his arrogance and hello, please save us to John Cohen and his experience as athletics director.

So there is a light at the end of this tunnel.

On Harsin, the less said, the better after Arkansas 41, Auburn 27. Anyone who engaged in or endorsed his hiring should not be permitted within three football fields of the next one. A fourth straight loss dropped the Tigers to 3-5 this year and 3-10 in their last 13 games. The last Auburn coach to suffer through a worse stretch: Shug Jordan lost the last four games of his first season in 1951 and went 2-8 in 1952 for a 2-12 period of darkness before the dawn.

At this point, let me apologize to the Jordan family for mentioning the beloved, salt-of-the-earth Shug in the same breath as the haughty Harsin. One has his name on the stadium because he embodied what it means to be an Auburn man. The other has been the antithesis, and he shouldn’t be allowed to darken that doorway for one more Saturday.