WarEagle1982

I have always said that the beginning of the end for Al Borges was after Aromashadu, Obamanu, and Mix graduated following the 2005 season. For whatever reason, they had recruited very poorly at WR during that time and Brandon Cox did not have the weapons he had in 05. Outside of the GT game in 05 he was pretty solid. 06 and 07 were rough in the passing game. Borges took the fall and then the Tony Franklin experiment happened. 🤢🤮

Amen to that. They played 9 teams that played in bowls (back before you had 560 bowls a year) and 5 teams that were ranked in the top 10 when they played them. Even that Bama team they played was a few plays away from being a top 5 team. They got penalized for not blowing Michigan out, but if you look back at it that was a really solid Michigan team that had lost two close games on the road against ranked opponents. Beating Michigan and Bo Schembechler in those days was a big win no matter what the score was.

Nice video. The Iron Bowl in the late 80s was some of the best rivalry football ever played. Stacy Danley was one of the toughest players to ever walk the Plains. It’s also really crazy to see the parallels between Auburn’s only touchdown drive in 87 and their only touchdown drive in 88: 1.) A long pass to Tillman (from the exact same part of the field). 2.) A big run by Danley. 3.) A touchdown by a guy with a ton of promise that did not finish their career (87- Harry Mose. 88- Vincent Harris). It’s really weird how similar they both were.

1988 Tennessee game was my first time in Jordan-Hare. I had just recently turned 8 years old. Great introduction to AU football!!!!

That defense had a lot of 3 star and below talent on it that really got coached up very well and played with fire and passion. 2006 and 2007 were two of the more physical secondaries AU has ever had.

I have coached both of these schemes at the high school level. The Zone Read scheme, being based off of inside zone blocking, is a much more effective scheme at picking up blitzes when teams start trying to bring them. The Power Read, being a gap scheme, is much less effective against the blitz. Also, the inside zone can help out with deficiencies in offensive linemen who aren’t just bulldozers because they don’t necessarily have to get as much push and can “cover” people up and allow backs to run to daylight. If you do have linemen who can push people around you can be absolutely dominant with it (i.e. 2013). Having said that, I have noticed Malzahn using the Power Read more with Nix (the play he fumbled on against UGA) but they will probably continue to be heavy inside zone.

If they could have pulled Muschamp in a year earlier then 2005 could have been a championship season. They were still really good on offense (statistics were actually as good as 2004). That 2006 team was so inconsistent. I was at the Arkansas debacle that year and it blew my mind even though Arkansas had a good team. Houston Nutt has Tubby’s number. Then the UGA game that year was also totally inexplicable. The Dawgs kicked their faces in. I really believe 2002 would have been a really good year if not for the Daniel Cobb experiment of 01 and early 02. They should have gone with Campbell from the beginning and let it roll. They were really inconsistent that year as well. They got blasted at home by Arkansas and also struggled to force overtime against a bad Syracuse team that lost to Temple that year.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Bama coach playing the rules to his advantage.

Yes. No doubt. Physical violence in the scorching heat.

I’m going to agree totally on the 1986 team. That was a really good football team that had the misfortune of falling victim to the curse of Florida Field and then just playing poorly overall against a very average UGA team. That Bama team they beat at the end of the year was a really good that had been ranked either 2 or 3 at one point. 1993 definitely comes to mind. While reality tells me that beating Florida again would have been unlikely my gut says they would have found a way to win. 2005 was definitely a team that missed their chance. If John Vaughn just makes ONE FIELD GOAL out of the five he missed they go back to Atlanta and rematch UGA at a time when they were playing really good football.

This wasn’t the only time Danley got knocked out in a game. Spencer Hammond knocked him cold in the 88 Iron Bowl. He came back in later and had a huge run right after a long Lawyer Tillman catch on AU’s only TD drive of the game. He was definitely one of the toughest guys to ever put on that AU uniform and embodied the mentality of Pat Dye football.

I remember this game vividly. I was 6 years old. I had a a t-shirt my grandfather bought me that said “Santa Clause brought Tiger Paws. War Eagle! 21-17.” I wore that shirt proudly until I grew out of it. Wonderful memories!!

Oh yeah. I remember that quite well.

I remember watching this game as a 14 year old. Auburn played uncharacteristically bad in the first half especially in the secondary where they were normally very solid. Jay Barker hurt them with big plays in the passing game and then didn’t piss a drop afterwards. I also remember the offense having a couple of other opportunities to score and blowing them. One was a pass by Nix that Damien Jefferies batted at the LOS and intercepted. They really should never have been in that position at the end of the game.

There are a large number of these great Auburn men in this video that are no longer with us. Lorino, Langner, Crain, Burkett, Sullivan, Howard (the trainer), Ardillo (who lived to be 100), Harold Hallman. I think that is it, but there may be more. So many of them were taken too soon. It’s great to watch these and hear the stories of the past.