Paul Finebaum assesses Hugh Freeze's candidacy at Auburn, possibility of a surprise hire

As Auburn continues the hunt for a new head football coach, it was reported Saturday that Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin would not be the man for the job and plans on staying on Oxford. The report was followed by one that established Liberty head coach Hugh Freeze as the top candidate for the job instead, which ESPN college football analyst Paul Finebaum spoke about with Matt Barrie on Sunday following week 13.

“Note to the audience, I know sometimes we get too ‘Inside Baseball’ but the second the Kiffin story is out that he’s staying the next story comes out that Hugh Freeze is next in line. Now where does that come from? Does Hugh Freeze call up these reporters?” Finebaum asked. “No, that’s (Jimmy) Sexton, he represents Hugh Freeze too, Sexton throws that one out there trying to force Auburn into a corner.”

Sexton is the agent of both Kiffin and Freeze, who’s likely had his hands full the last few days. But so has Freeze, as his team has gone from an 8-1 start to the season to losing their last three games, their latest being a 35-point loss to New Mexico State after entering the matchup 24-point favorites.

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“And then what happens Matt, Hugh Freeze’s team goes out and lays the biggest egg I think of the year in college football, I don’t even remember the team they lost to, is it New Mexico State? We talked about Hugh Freeze Monday weeks ago when they beat BYU and Arkansas and then they just fall apart down the stretch,” Finebaum said. “Why I’m sure because Hugh Freeze is rumored to be leaving and then some of the people at Liberty were yelling yesterday ‘go to Auburn coach’, I mean that’s how bad things have gotten.”

Freeze has had some late-season struggles with the Flames, and did not have a graceful exit from his previous head coaching stint with Ole Miss, but could bring valuable SEC coaching experience and success to a Tiger’s program that very much needs it.

“And he does not come into Auburn clean, there’s some people that really are going ‘okay so you almost fired Bryan Harsin a couple of months ago because of all these rumors and now you’re bringing in Hugh Freeze, what’s going on here?’ He’s still a very good coach, repeat after me, he beat Nick Saban two years in a row, we all know that,” Finebaum explained. “He’s coached in the SEC, he got fired for a lot of reasons, and I bring all that up to say none of that matters anymore to anyone because this is a new era in college football. So he limps into the job assuming it’s him, if it’s not him Matt, your guess would be as good as mine.”

Barrie brought up the possibility of Auburn potentially making an unexpected, splash hire like USC did with Lincoln Riley this offseason, but Finebaum knows that if that’s the case, that they will likely find out at the same time fans across the nation would as well.

“And there are a lot of names making the rounds, we’ll spare you because as Matt reiterated and we could do this at midnight, we like to do this in the morning to get it to you so you can digest it while you’re still thinking about last weekend. So that’s what we know, and what we know is about the same as you probably knew before you turned this podcast on,” Finebaum said.