What exactly was everyone expecting in Harsin's first season?

[FormerlySec38Row34 56]

Saban went 7-6 in his first season at bammer, so I ask, what were you expecting?

[e808 3,028]

11 minutes ago, FormerlySec38Row34 said:

Saban went 7-6 in his first season at bammer, so I ask, what were you expecting?

Why do people continuously make this comparison. Does Harsin have a national championship. Did he have stops at other power 5 schools, coach in the pros or have a top recruiting class in tow.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 6, 2021 by e808

[AUwent 3,784]

See below. Just fill out the recruiting part and wa-la.

Edited December 6, 2021 by AUwent

[Hank2020 3,232]

27 minutes ago, FormerlySec38Row34 said:

Saban went 7-6 in his first season at bammer, so I ask, what were you expecting?

Everyone should be honest and their answer mesh with what they placed in the original thread on predicting the season results.

[e808 3,028]

4 minutes ago, Hank2020 said:

Everyone should be honest and their answer mesh with what they placed in the original thread on predicting the season results.

I expected 8 myself and the team was definitely on course. No need to keep rehashing the past of why it didn’t happen 

[Auctoritas 2,832]

I figured wins vs the cupcakes, then wins vs USC, Arky, and MSST, then pick two of either picking off Ole Miss, surprising one of the traditional rivals, or winning a bowl game.

But, as we say ad nauseum, it's not the wins, its how you get there. He's not on the hot seat, but going 0-fer in November is..inauspicious.

 

(I should note that I am not defining "expectations" is not "what I think must happen to be successful" - rather, what my gut told me was logical outcomes. If we define "expectations" as what would be less-than-dumpster-fire, 6-7 was the floor. But, again, how you do it.)

[AcUmen 242]

If I'm not mistaken, Saban's first class was #1 in the nation. The REC got things rolling fast for him.

[TigerHorn 1,357]

42 minutes ago, e808 said:

Why do people continuously make this comparison. Does Harsin have a national championship. Did he have stops at other power 5 schools, coach in the pros or have a top recruiting class in tow.

 

 

 

 

"People" also forget that Saban's LSU MNC was the result of a historic combination of flukes and they didn't have to play #1 USC due to computer polls favoring OU, who lost the B12 champ game in a blowout 35-7 before playing LSU. NCAA was offered $31M to stage a game between USC and LSU for a true championship. Saban was a failure in the NFL, no way to spin that one. He was just OK at MSU. I'll give you the recruiting class. 

Edited December 6, 2021 by TigerHorn

[clwn 336]

I expected a tougher more physical well coached team than under the previous staff. I knew it would be an average season, but as long as they fought hard in the losses all would be okay. Well, got a more physical team, but horrific coaching in the losses and the GA St scare. 

[AuCivilEng1 11,115]

1 hour ago, FormerlySec38Row34 said:

Saban went 7-6 in his first season at bammer, so I ask, what were you expecting?

Us not to lose our last 4 games whilst failing to score more points more than 10 point in the second half of all 4 of those loses. 

[DAG 34,123]

Win games we are suppose to win, Lose games we typically were expected to lose. No reason we couldn't get 8 wins out of this season.

[Tiger 8,835]

8 wins because that's our damn floor as an SEC power with conference championship and CFP birth expectations

[GwillMac6 20,815]

8 minutes ago, Tiger said:

8 wins because that's our damn floor as an SEC power with conference championship and CFP birth expectations

[Mikey 16,781]

My pre-season prediction was 10-2. Last year with 10 big games we were 6-4. This year with 9 big games and alleged better coaching, 7-2 should have been within reason. Add the 3 gimme games and it's 10-2.

[GwillMac6 20,815]

5 minutes ago, Mikey said:

My pre-season prediction was 10-2. Last year with 10 big games we were 6-4. This year with 9 big games and alleged better coaching, 7-2 should have been within reason. Add the 3 gimme games and it's 10-2.

We lost 2 games we should of won (south carolina and Miss ST) and we won 2 games most people thought we would lose against better teams in Ole Miss and Arky. It all evened out.  Nothing about this team resembled anything close to a 10-2 team with our obvious weaknesses. 

[TexasTiger 13,388]

To beat South Carolina. Go at least 7-5.

[AUreo 759]

I think the team looked most confident vs Penn State, LSU, and Arkansas. They looked like a typical Auburn team. 

Something happened during the second half vs Ole Miss and the whole personality of the team changed for the rest of the season.

Edited December 6, 2021 by AUreo

[AUght2win 6,919]

2 hours ago, FormerlySec38Row34 said:

Saban went 7-6 in his first season at bammer, so I ask, what were you expecting?

Not to lose 4 straight to finish the year.

[GwillMac6 20,815]

1 hour ago, AUreo said:

I think the team looked most confident vs Penn State, LSU, and Arkansas. They looked like a typical Auburn team. 

Something happened during the second half vs Ole Miss and the whole personality of the team changed for the rest of the season.

First half vs Miss St was the best passing I have seen in a long time from a AU team. Maybe ever in my 32 years. It is certainly very weird what happened both second halve's vs the MS schools on offense.

[AU80cruiser 1,102]

44 minutes ago, GwillMac6 said:

First half vs Miss St was the best passing I have seen in a long time from a AU team. Maybe ever in my 32 years. It is certainly very weird what happened both second halve's vs the MS schools on offense.

Our receivers arent good enough. We need upgrades. QB could be better too although I thought Bo played decent in a few games. I hope we find someone better in the portal this year.

[tigeraddikt 1,626]

4 hours ago, AUwent said:

See below. Just fill out the recruiting part and wa-la.

Did you mean to say voila and ended up putting the USPS abbreviations for Washington and Louisiana? Asking for a friend…

[tigeraddikt 1,626]

2 hours ago, AUreo said:

I think the team looked most confident vs Penn State, LSU, and Arkansas. They looked like a typical Auburn team. 

Something happened during the second half vs Ole Miss and the whole personality of the team changed for the rest of the season.

Do you mean Miss State instead of Ole Miss? 

[SRBautigerfan 1,040]

I expected 7-5 or 6-6, because I figured our OL wouldn’t be any better than it was in 2020.  I’m still disappointed because there were game we could have easily won instead of finding a way to lose.  Harsin has talked a good game but if you can’t make it materialize we’ll need to go in a different direction.  He needs at least 3 years unless the wheels fly off next year.

[shabby 1,958]

I said 6 and 6 on the old pres season thread back in August. If you wanna know what everyone expected that would be a good thread to bump

[aucom96 1,648]

Returning talent levels looked to be roughly on par with an 8 win Malzahn type season, but with a new coach and system I expected some bumps. My preseason prediction was 7 wins. My expectations...

More physical. This didn't happen. We played a very loose zone defense with minimal pass rush, our offensive line looked worse at times from last season, we couldn't run the ball with any consistency and relied primarily on Bo Nix scrambling out of the pocket...same as last season. 

Better discipline. We were very slightly better in overall penalties committed per game over the course of the season. We still have issues tackling. Turnover margin was much worse this season and our receivers were pretty bad all around. Special teams was as bad as I've seen in a number of years. 

Improvement over the season. This was the most disturbing to me. We definitely seemed to regress over the course of the season, continually blowing leads and looking lost in the second half. The defense showed some improvement in spots, but overall it was not encouraging. 

Improved recruiting. This remains to be seen, but right now things aren't looking good. 

So...I didn't expect championships or anything, but I also didn't expect our biggest successes to come against Arkansas and Ole Miss either... or to be returning to the Birmingham Bowl. Harsin has a lot to prove.