At his weekly press conference on Tuesday, Auburn head football coach Gus Malzahn was asked about frequently being on the coaching “hot seat.”
Malzahn is one of the most successful head coaches in Auburn history, however his Tigers are 5-4 in this SEC-only season.
“I’ve got a job that I’ve said before expects to win championships, and I do, too,” Malzahn said in his presser.
“The years that you’re not in the mix, that’s just part of it. I’m blessed to be here and excited not only about this game, but I’m excited about next year,” he continued.
Auburn is scheduled to play Mississippi State in Starkville on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. This will be the final game of Auburn’s 2020 regular season.
Malzahn, on the importance of finishing the season strong, advised, “I think it’s very important. We actually talked about that with our team Sunday after the game. We weren’t fortunate enough to get these seniors out on a victory [at home], so this is a big game for us, and we want to do everything in our power to try and get a victory. It’s not going to be easy, on the road in our league with a team that’s playing good football right now. It’ll be a challenge, but I think it’ll be very important if we can get the victory.”
He also talked about preparing to face the Mike Leach-led Bulldogs, who are 2-6 on the year.
“Last SEC road game, last SEC game for us. This is our 10th game, and if you think back to over the summer and somebody told us we would have made it through 10 SEC games, that would’ve been a big accomplishment,” Malzahn remarked. “I’m real proud of our team and the way they handled themselves with the COVID etiquette and everything that goes with it. We’re playing a Mississippi State team that you see is probably playing their best ball of the season. They played Georgia and Ole Miss on the road very close and had a chance to win those games. If you look at their defense, they’re very good against the run. They’re very disruptive with the different things they do. Offensively, I’m really impressed with the quarterback; since he’s taken over the starting job he’s protected the ball very well considering how many times he’s thrown the ball. I’m looking forward to playing our last SEC game on the road against a very solid Mississippi State team.”
Speaking more to how well he thinks Mississippi State is playing at the moment, Auburn’s coach added, “I think their defense has been disruptive all year. When you watch them on film against some really good offenses, they’ve done a really good job against the run. I think the big thing is that they’re protecting the football better than they did in the first half of the season. I think it’s really a combination of those two things.”
“They’ve had an off-week to prepare for us,” Malzahn stated. “That’s two weeks to prepare. Earlier in the year, when we were going to play them, we had an off-week leading up to that and we had a few practices to at least get a foundation of what they do and kind of how to play against that. Hopefully, that’ll help us and it’ll be a good recall from that week that we can run with.”
Sean Ross is the editor of Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
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