Joseph Goodman: Bryan Harsin never had a shot

He never had a shot.

Finally, Bryan Harsin is gone. He lasted less than two seasons at Auburn, but it felt like he created enough embarrassment to last a decade.

Hired during a pandemic, Harsin will go down as one of the worst football coaches in the history of the Southeastern Conference. Officially, Auburn University fired Harsin on Monday, October 31, 2022, but know that the business of rebuilding Auburn football without Harsin has been gathering form behind the scenes for months. Better days are ahead for Auburn football, and the future begins with the hiring of a new athletics director.

It has been a busy few days on The Plains.

On Saturday, during Auburn’s 41-27 loss to Arkansas at Jordan-Hare Stadium, news leaked of Auburn’s interest in John Cohen, a native of Tuscaloosa and a longtime SEC baseball coach who has been the director of athletics at Mississippi State since 2016. Cohen resigned from his post at Mississippi State on Monday morning, and Auburn fired Harsin a few hours later.

The timing of these moves can’t be ignored. Auburn plays Mississippi State in six days, and the Tigers’ loss to Mississippi State in 2021 was the beginning of the end for Harsin. It was during that loss that former Auburn quarterback Bo Nix broke his leg, but remained in the game after the injury.

Nix never played for Auburn again, and transferred to the University of Oregon after the 2021 season. With Nix at quarterback, Oregon is currently ranked No. 8 nationally in the AP Top 25 Poll with a record of 7-1 overall and 5-0 in the Pac-12. Without Nix at quarterback, Harsin’s Auburn teams never won another game against a Power 5 opponent outside of that gift of a victory from Missouri earlier this season.

Going into Mississippi State week, Auburn has lost seven of its last eight games against teams in the SEC, and that lone dub came by way of Missouri running back Nathaniel Peat fumbling untouched at the goal line mere feet away from winning the game in overtime. But Auburn Jesus can only be expected to do so much. With Harsin, the Tigers were cursed from the beginning.

Thankfully, the hex of Harsin is now broken. By trick or treat, Auburn ended the misery of its zombie football coach on Halloween. In my column after Saturday’s game, I wrote these words: “Allow Auburn to wipe its memory clean of these last two years. Harsin had his introductory news conference on Christmas Eve. Release this shadow of a coach on All Hallows’ Eve.”

Done and done.

Let the healing begin, please. It will take money, but Auburn appears ready to spend it. It always is. The school paid Gus Malzahn $21.45 million to go away in 2020, and Harsin’s buyout is reportedly $15.5 million. A new coach will not come cheaply, and it is a short list of candidates who can compete with Alabama’s Nick Saban and Georgia’s Kirby Smart on the recruiting trail. On the top of Auburn’s list should be the name Lane Kiffin, and if the former Mississippi State athletics director can hire away Kiffin from Ole Miss, then Auburn will instantly become the sexiest little village in the SEC.

With Kiffin at the helm of football and Bruce Pearl running basketball, there wouldn’t be a bigger spotlight in the country than the one shining on Auburn.

Cohen, Auburn’s incoming athletics director, is an SEC lifer and he understands what it means to coach in this league. For Auburn football, it means having the players necessary to compete against Alabama and Georgia, and doing what it takes to get them to Auburn. Auburn is amassing its war-chest for the next recruiting class through significant donations to its NIL collectives.

Thanks to NIL and the transfer portal, floundering teams with wealth and prestige can rebuild quickly. Look at USC. Coach Lincoln Riley left Oklahoma for USC and immediately began pulling in elite talent like former Oklahoma quarterback Caleb Williams and former Pitt receiver Jordan Addison. That can be Auburn’s model for success with the right hire.

Someone like Kiffin, in other words.

Auburn restored its status as an elite destination for a marquee coach with the firing of Harsin. Harsin never had the respect for Auburn that it deserves. In this column, Harsin was held accountable for his lack of transparency during the pandemic and then his lack of talent as a coach. Those two things were not unrelated.

Harsin refused to support vaccination for COVID-19, and then he refused to address his vaccination status even when Auburn employees were required by policy to be vaccinated or face termination. The state of Alabama then changed its laws before Auburn’s vaccination deadline.

Harsin displayed a disgusting lack of respect for Auburn, the people of Alabama and the responsibility for a position of power during a crisis. Harsin failed to lead Auburn in all things, and so it was no surprise that Auburn did not show even the respect for Harsin’s name in its brief note announcing his removal. It did mention the word leadership, though.

“Auburn University has decided to make a change in the leadership of the Auburn University football program,” said the release.

Harsin didn’t know how to recruit in the SEC, but he couldn’t even retain the talent he had. His two best assets were Nix and defensive coordinator Derek Mason, and they both left after the 2021 season. Nix was a legacy player and a three-year starter. Mason took a pay cut to leave Auburn for Oklahoma State.

They understood before anyone else. Auburn remains a complicated work of art, challenging to unlock but rare. Harsin painted by the numbers, and wanted people to believe he was Picasso.

Joseph Goodman is a columnist for the Alabama Media Group, and author of “We Want Bama: A season of hope and the making of Nick Saban’s ‘ultimate team’”. You can find him on Twitter @JoeGoodmanJr.