John Cohen explains his plan to improve facilities at Auburn

At his introductory press conference on Tuesday, new Auburn athletics director John Cohen shared his vision for facility improvements on campus. He shared that improvements are “absolutely” on his to-do list as he listens to coaches, administrators and athletes about what the programs need moving forward.

“I’ve spent a lot of time early on listening,” Cohen said. “I think that’s one of the things about being a little more advanced in my career. You know 20 years ago, I would have done a lot less listening and a lot more telling or talking.”

“I’m going to walk around these great facilities that we have and we’re going to do the very best we can to make them elite,” Cohen continued. “We already have elite facilities here at Auburn University, but there’s always improvements. You’ve heard this expression no doubt about the arms race in the Southeastern Conference. We’re always going to have great facilities but that means we have to keep up and we have to keep competing in that space. So, we will always work on that.”

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Although new facilities are always exciting, the question at the forefront of every Tiger fan’s mind currently is what Cohen’s plan is for hiring the next head football coach.

Cohen describes ‘very long’ hiring process

“I thought someone might ask that question,” Cohen said. “This is a very, very long process. In fact, I have 58 things on this piece of paper that we go through as we go through this process. It starts with culture, it starts with Xs and Os, and it starts with recruiting.

“Those three things have to be upfront but there’s a whole lot of other things that have to be answered before you get really deep into it.”

Despite explaining his top criteria for the job, Cohen didn’t want to discuss timelines for inking a replacement for Bryan Harsin. Ostensibly, the Tigers will have a new head coach in place in time to shore up recruits by the early signing period.

“It obviously dominates my time, which it should,” Cohen said. “The head coaching job of the Auburn football team is a critical decision and we take the utmost seriousness. There will not be anything we don’t look at. Everything’s on the table… but I’m not going to go into dates and times, and process, and when the finish line is going to be. We’ll get there when we get there and we’ll make the right decision for this great institution.