AD John Cohen compares Hugh Freeze to Bruce Pearl: 'you could be talking to the same guy'

Auburn Athletic Director John Cohen joined Andy Burcham and Brad Law on Tiger Talk Thursday night. He answered questions about new Auburn coach Hugh Freeze and why Cadillac Williams was kept.

Auburn Live is here to provide each of his answers.

Deep process in hiring Freeze

Andy Burcham: Could you talk through your hiring process and your list of things in hiring the head coach.

John Cohen: When you make a decision of this magnitude, you treat it with the utmost seriousness. The great thing about being a part of a tradition or a family like the Auburn family, people have thoughts–for sure they share those thoughts. But you’ve got to go deep, deep, deep and you have to find out everything. When you have a coach who has coached at as many places as Hugh has, you have to go to every one of those places to find out why they had success and what the relationship was with the student-athletes. And, to find out what their abilities were to recruit. You’ve got to do your due diligence, because that’s what we get paid to do.

Brad Law: Were there any characteristics or elements of his vision for his plan for Auburn football that helped him stand out?

John Cohen: I think there’s a great recruiting plan, I think there’s a great plan.. The truth of the matter is this: when you talk to someone for an hour or more, they can sell you on anything. But, when you talk to student-athletes, coaches that competed against and with him, and you talk about parents who have student-athletes who played for him. When they all start to say the same thing about his vision, about his recruiting, and how much he cares and identifies with the players themselves, then you’ve really got something there. That’s what we found in Hugh Freeze.

Freeze similar to Pearl

Andy Burcham: You mentioned fit a lot, do you think Hugh Freeze is that “fit” at Auburn University?

John Cohen: Well, when we first started the process, and we looked at all the criteria, Hugh Freeze jumped out at us. I just kept thinking, he is such a great fit for this job. But, I wanted to go deep, I wanted to interview several people, and I wanted to make sure he was the right decision. We kind of started with Hugh and ended up with Hugh for all the same reasons. He’s going to do a great job in this community in so many ways. I know Bruce (Pearl) is from Boston, and I know Hugh is from Mississippi, but when you’re talking to them, close your eyes and take the accents out, you could be talking to the same guy. Both of those guys have so much energy, so much passion and they just connect with the community. Now, you’ve still got to win games. I just mentioned Bruce and he’s won a ton of games. I really believe that Hugh can do that here–will do that here.

Brad Law: Were you surprised at all with the reaction that Cadillac got when it was announced he would be staying on as associate head coach?

John Cohen: I was. I was a guy who watched him play from afar. I knew he was a great player, knew he was a great NFL player. I knew that the Auburn community loved him. Four weeks ago, when we were playing (Texas) A&M, I don’t know if I’ve ever experienced anything like that in my life. Honestly, I walk into that game and I think, ‘we’re playing for a national championship’. Here’s two teams that both have three wins late in the year. The atmosphere, the energy, and all that came from Cadillac–when we interviewed Hugh, the first thing he said was, ‘do you think we can get Cadillac? He’s that important to my staff. You think he’d be willing to be a part of this?’. I said that’s something you’re going to have to discuss with him. Cadillac has been phenomenal. He’s going to be on this staff and he’s going to be a huge part of Auburn football from this point forward.

How Cohen landed on Freeze

Andy Burcham: Could you talk about the folks that helped you, that you relied on, in the last part of the coaching search?

John Cohen: Well, start with the Southeastern Conference office, and Briarcrest High School where he was, Ole Miss, Arkansas State, Liberty, Lambeth. Everywhere he’s been, we checked in. That common theme of former student-athletes, former trainers, former student-managers and they all gave the same answers. ‘Hey, I want to work with that guy. He’s got energy, he shows up every day with tremendous passion. Again, sounds a lot like a guy you’re about to talk to on your show here (Bruce Pearl).

Andy Burcham: Who were some of the people working with you to make the hire?

John Cohen: Certainly Rich McGlynn was working with me. Lee Vanhorn, who is my chief of staff who was just working in a law firm in Arkansas did a ton of legal background for me. We had a search firm, and two different analytics firm as well.

Andy Burcham: How did the analytics firm work?

John Cohen: There are so many different categories. One of the most intriguing to me was those guys say is this coach supposed to win this game based on their talent and the talent they’re facing? Ok, so you’re really finding out the coaching ability. Is this guy recruiting at a level that is higher for the norm for that school? Is he recruiting at a level that is competitive with the rest of the league? When this guy plays against this guy, what’s the talent deficit? What’s really interesting is, and he was ranked so high with the available coaches to us, but some of the best coaches in college football rarely ever play a team that has more talent than their own team. You really, in some cases Andy, can’t determine how good of a coach they are when they are always more talented than their opponent.