Auburn's big three sports need to step it up

[tigerfan1234 0]

We should consistently be in the top 25 and competing for championships. I understand having a down year now and again, but three or four down years in a row will never build a winner. Auburn has the potential to be dominant, but we always fall below the elite category. Other schools are doing it consistently, why can't we?

[JohnDeere 0]

We should consistently be in the top 25 and competing for championships.  I understand having a down year now and again, but three or four down years in a row will never build a winner.  Auburn has the potential to be dominant, but we always fall below the elite category.  Other schools are doing it consistently, why can't we?

235264[/snapback]

Worst post to start a thread ever.

[tigerfan1234 0]

You don't like what I say, but it is the truth. We have never consistently been dominant. I am just asking people why they feel we are not an elite school athletically and what we can do to get there. It's an honest question worthy of discussing in my book.

[Texan4Auburn 1,626]

Board of trustees is one main reason, they have a rep of sticking their nose into the athletic department.

Alumni support for the other sports would be another.

[rolltoomer 0]

Lebo will lead Auburn to some round-ball glory.

Then he'll be gone.

ACC, no doubt.

[TitanTiger 20,499]

You don't like what I say, but it is the truth.  We have never consistently been dominant.  I am just asking people why they feel we are not an elite school athletically and what we can do to get there.  It's an honest question worthy of discussing in my book.

235266[/snapback]

Other schools have some periods where all three sports (football, basketball and baseball) are dominant but almost no one does it consistently, so that expectation is a bit unrealistic. In fact, it's often hard to find schools that are consistently dominant in two of the three. Think about the elite basketball programs: UNC, Kansas, Duke, UConn, Syracuse, Kentucky, UCLA, etc. Most only have sporatic success in football, much less baseball. Now think about the teams that have been near the top in football lately (last 5 years or so): USC, Oklahoma, Texas, FSU, Auburn, Miami, Ohio State, etc. Of those, only Texas has had a great run in all three sports recently and Miami usually has a good baseball team. Ohio State has done well in basketball. But the bottom line is, dominance in all three consistently just doesn't happen very often at all.

I do think we can be better in baseball and basketball than we're showing and I expect better.

[tigerfan1234 0]

Maybe dominant is a little strong, but my point is still the same. We are capable of performing at a higher level more consistently. I believe Auburn's big three sports should push for a major bowl, college world series, and at least sweet sixteen every three or four years. It seems as though we make a good run one year and then fall by the wayside for 5 or more years. It's like we go dormant for awhile. I would like for us to be a household name and highly respected across the country. Right now, not many people outside of the south are familiar with Auburn and I don't believe the Auburn name carries the mystique in other people's eyes like Michigan, Notre Dame, USC, Duke, UCLA, Stanford, Miami, Ohio State, Florida, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and a few others.

[vatz22au 142]

Maybe dominant is a little strong, but my point is still the same.  We are capable of performing at a higher level more consistently.  I believe Auburn's big three sports should push for a major bowl, college world series, and at least sweet sixteen every three or four years.  It seems as though we make a good run one year and then fall by the wayside for 5 or more years.  It's like we go dormant for awhile.  I would like for us to be a household name and highly respected across the country.  Right now, not many people outside of the south are familiar with Auburn and I don't believe the Auburn name carries the mystique in other people's eyes like Michigan, Notre Dame, USC, Duke, UCLA, Stanford, Miami, Ohio State, Florida, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and a few others.

235289[/snapback]

Auburns football team has been pretty dominant for the past couple of years. Our basketball team, while they need alot of work, is only a couple of years shy from the last time they were in the sweet 16 (trying to remember if they even got further than that). Baseball... well they need alot of work as well.

I dont know who you've talked to outside the south...but last time I was up North wearing an AU hat, I ran into alot of random conversations about AU football and the teams up north.

[AURainman 6]

We should consistently be in the top 25 and competing for championships.  I understand having a down year now and again, but three or four down years in a row will never build a winner.  Auburn has the potential to be dominant, but we always fall below the elite category.  Other schools are doing it consistently, why can't we?

235264[/snapback]

Worst post to start a thread ever.

235265[/snapback]

Absolutely the worst post ever.

Its fine to have an opinion, but Geez.

Its one thing to say, "I think Auburn should do this to get better." But all you've said is..."We need to be dominate."

..in related news

"Poor people need money."

"Hungry people need food." etc.

You state the obvious but offer no substance. Thanks.

[freebody 0]

Big three? I think we have a chance to sweep the big 3 this year - football, men's swimming/diving, and women's swimming/diving...........

Now, over at that smaller school near Vance, they are still looking for a couple of titles to bookend this year's rock-paper-scissors championship.

[AUHansel 0]

I don't understand what is going on with our basketball program. We've had a lot of good players but they keep transferring. I heard some more are going to this year too.

[tigerfan1234 0]

Sorry if you don't like my post, but some of you people can be complete jerks. I have read 10,000 posts on AUnation and many of the "regulars" post some pretty meaningless things too. This sight is just a little clique where all the "regulars" get to pat each other on the back and marvel at each other all the time.

[mcgufcm 4,107]

i understand the sentiment against a post saying "auburn isn't dominant; why?" but it's not completely meaningless to talk about.

i think one of the big reasons is that auburn fans, outside of football, are bandwagon fans. you all know i'm right. i love auburn, and i'll go watch us be crappy at any ole sport, but i'll only get upset at failure when it occurs on the gridiron. i went to TONS of basketball at auburn, and i never really cared when we lost. but i was sure quick to jump on the marquis daniels bandwagon. i even followed the team to albany (and we lost in the sweet 16 to syracuse in a one point game).

the point is: we don't care when the "other" sports don't succeed, and that apathy translates into mediocrity. we'll jump all over the bandwagon when they start winning, but it's not a big deal for most auburn fans when they don't. only the football team MUST win. the rest are there to excite us from time to time, but that's about all.

auburn baseball was great for a lot of years, but looking back it was only b/c hal beard kept them there. auburn swimming/diving is the arguably the most dominant program in college athletics, but it's all b/c of david marsh. if he left, would any of you honestly get really upset (i mean like losing to georgia tech upset) to see the program backslide? auburn basketball has great moments, but you can almost always trace it back to single players: marquis daniels, chris porter, chuck person. it's not a consistent program b/c we don't DEMAND success.

maybe i'm wrong, but i've been around auburn athletics since birth and that's the vibe i've gotten from the go. we're bandwagon fans, and bandwagon fans yield inconsistent teams b/c they lose our attention and we kinda stop supporting them and you end up with a facility like beard eaves. that's just auburn.

[tigerfan1234 0]

Thank you for your honest assesment to my question mcgufcm. The question has a lot of validity if people would just think outside the box a little. I purposefully left the question open-ended because it makes people consider answers that you don't think about until a question like the one I asked comes up. I believe the most honest and correct answer is the one provided above: Auburn fans just don't care about anything other than football and that is why we will continue to be mediocre to good. I am trying to raise awareness for our other big sports because we are all one family. Sure football is hugely important, but there is no reason why basketball and baseball could not approach football in terms of importance and excitement. I love Auburn tremendously and it really dissapoints me to witness the overall lack of support for everything esle Auburn. All of our eggs go into one basket. I would like to see the basket be full of multiple golden eggs.

[tigerfan1234 0]

I believe our other problem is that we only measure Auburn's overall success by what Alabama does every year. I would rather lose to Bama every year and compete for championships. I know I will get jumped on for this one.

[Ranger12 46]

I for one am disappointed how bad the basketball program has gotten. I am also getting impatient withe baseball team which I actually follow more closely then the basketball team. If there had been one program at that had been consistent for a great number of years, it was the baseball team. It used to be that at the end of every year, we wondered what our seed would be and where we would be seed in the regional brackets of the CWS. Now we can't even qualify to play in the freakin' SEC tournament!

Those two programs need to step it up, but thank goodness our swimming/diving teams have taken up some of the slack. Who could ever imagined that a land-locked small rural town would be the dominant force in NCAA Div-1 swimming and diving, over schools like Stanford and UCLA, who used to be the only schools with such a good program. I love it. I lived to close to , I would attend the meets.