Hugh Freeze will have some help when it comes to calling Auburn’s offense this fall, but the Tigers’ new head coach isn’t completing ceding play-calling duties entering Year 1.

During his introductory press conference in late November, Freeze entertained the idea of giving up play-calling as he takes over on the Plains, and while new offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery will handle primary play-calling duties for Auburn, Freeze will still have a say — particularly in certain situations.

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“I’m still going to call a share of them, depending on what that looks like — probably more in the warp-tempo world,” Freeze said Thursday. “We really don’t know exactly what it looks like, but I know that I have great confidence in Philip as a play-caller, and I have great confidence in he and Kent (Austin, offensive analyst) and Jake (Thornton, offensive line coach) and Ben (Aigamaua, tight ends coach) and Cadillac (Williams, running backs coach) and Marcus (Davis, wide receivers coach) and those guys that we brought to help formulate a gameplan, should I need to be elsewhere making sure that our program is right.”

Freeze is prioritizing the other aspects of being a head coach in the current landscape of college football, particularly as it pertains to recruiting, NIL and overseeing the day-to-day of the program as he works to rebuild it and implement his culture. He doesn’t believe it’s in the best interest of the program for him to have complete control of the offense — not with so many other responsibilities on his plate — but as a career play-caller dating back to his days as a high school coach in Tennessee, it’s understandable that Freeze would have a hard time completely letting go of that aspect of the job, even with a veteran play-caller like Montgomery overseeing the offense.

Montgomery, who was Tulsa’s head coach for the last eight seasons and before that was a successful coordinator at Baylor under Art Briles, had discussions with Freeze about their dynamic before accepting the job. The two share similar offensive philosophies, which helps, and as a former head coach himself, Montgomery has a perspective that has been shaped by the understanding of what that role entails compared to being solely an offensive coordinator.

“As we sat down and started talking about all of those scenarios and what that looked like, I think that’s why it was important for him to find somebody that had the same mindsets that he did, the same type of philosophy background that he had, to try to make that transition as smoothly as possible,” Montgomery said. “And so those conversations went really well for us, and we were able to kind of build and move forward from there.”

The two clicked pretty quickly during those conversations, and Montgomery jumped on board as Auburn’s offensive coordinator, bringing with him 29 years of experience on that side of the ball, including eight as a college coordinator and eight more as a head coach.

“I think we’re all a product of our experiences, and then obviously Philip having a vast amount of those is always helpful,” Freeze said. “…When you’re the primary play-caller, there’s a lot of times you feel like you need to be on the defensive channel, as a head coach and aware of, oh, we need a timeout here. But you’re also torn because you need to be on the headset saying, ‘Guys, what the heck are we going to do on the next series to fix this?’ So, I think, obviously Philip’s experiences are great, but ultimately the game management part rests on me, and I think that will also help me be more in-tune in the moment of things we need to do, we really need to slow this down. Sometimes, when you’re the play-caller and you feel like, ‘Look, I know what we can do right now,’ that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what’s best for the entire team.

“I think that I — when you’re calling it and you feel like this is what’s best for us to move the ball, is that the best thing for the team at that moment? I’m not sure. So, I think his experience is going to be helpful, but also I just think that’s another positive of me having people that have a great ability to do that.”

While Montgomery will handle primary play-calling and Freeze will have his areas and moments of specific decision-making on that front, the two expect to be on the same page with their offensive approach for Auburn this season.

“I think Coach and I have the same philosophy now because there’s going to be opportunities where we want to call like our hair’s on fire,” Montgomery said. “And there’s going to be other opportunities where we want to be able to control the tempo.”

Of course, there will be a learning curve as the two familiarize themselves with each others’ offensive philosophies and try to mesh their systems to create Auburn’s scheme for the upcoming season.

“Philip and I are trying to marry two systems — they’re very similar, we believe in the same things, but it’s a lot of different ways to get to them, and a lot of different things to call them,” Freeze said. “Somebody’s got to learn a new world, and I truthfully have called the offense that we’ve run pretty much the same verbiage since I was a high school coach, and so you’re taking 30 years of me calling this ‘cat,’ and he wants to call it ‘dog,’ which I’m really open, believe it or not. I’m really open to new ways. I just want to do what’s best, but it is a learning curve.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.