Charles Barkley admits he was disappointed in Auburn fans for treatment of Bryan Harsin

It’s been a turbulent few years in the Auburn football program, which saw the ouster of its head coach midway through the 2022 campaign. And at least one very prominent Auburn supporter is disappointed with the fanbase’s treatment of Bryan Harsin.

That’s Charles Barkley, the former superstar basketball player turned broadcaster.

“I was very disappointed the way the Auburn faithful treated coach Harsin,” Barkley said Wednesday at the Regions Tradition celebrity pro-am event. “Very disappointed the way we treated coach Harsin.”

Harsin was unceremoniously dumped after going 9-12 in a season and some change. But he was on the ropes long before that, as the administration began an offseason dig prior to 2022 into a surprising amount of attrition in the program, looking to see if Harsin had mistreated players.

In any case, whatever fair or unfair treatment Bryan Harsin received, the program did ultimately part ways with him.

Stepping in is former Ole Miss and Liberty coach Hugh Freeze, who will look to stabilize things and make the program competitive again in the SEC West.

“Now we’ve got coach Freeze, we’ve got to get behind him 100%,” Barkley said. “I’ve talked to him a couple times. He knows I’m always on the speed dial if he needs anything. And I’m excited. I think under the circumstances he did good recruiting-wise, I thought he did good in the transfer portal. And now the season’s going to start, hey, I’m excited.”

Freeze arrives with a fairly impressive track record as a coach. He’s put together a 103-47 (.687) record as a head coach, though 29 of those wins were vacated for NCAA violations at Ole Miss. Most recently Freeze spent four years at Liberty, going 34-15 with three bowl wins in three appearances.

While simply getting the program back to a competitive level on a weekly basis will be the chief task for Freeze, eventually competing with Alabama more regularly will also be on the docket for the new head coach.

Auburn has lost three straight to its arch-rival, as well as seven of the last nine.

For Barkley, though, that’s secondary. He hopes Freeze gets a warmer welcome than the treatment Bryan Harsin received.

“That doesn’t matter to me, to be honest with you,” the Hall of Famer said. “It just matters to me what we do at Auburn. Coach (Nick) Saban‘s the greatest college football coach ever. I’ve got a lot of admiration and respect for him, but we just need to get ourselves together at Auburn. Never worry about other people.

“I like our coach. I’m excited for the season and I think we’re going to have a very good season.”