Scarbinsky Article:Gene Chizik set the table for his own dismissal at Auburn

quote:

---

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - They were all warned.

Auburn President Jay Gogue. Some Auburn trustees. Former Auburn coach Pat Dye.

Long before Alabama 49, Auburn 0, official and unofficial Auburn power brokers were told during the past off-season that Gene Chizik’s football program was coming apart at the seams.

Some of the problems, like a number of arrests and behavior issues, were public and obvious. Others were readily apparent only to insiders, and several of them spoke to al.com on condition of anonymity.

Some players weren’t going to class. Others weren’t working out. What should have been mandatory workouts became optional, and the authority of head strength and conditioning coach Kevin Yoxall was severely undermined.

Chizik was informed of at least some of the issues, and he raised the academic issue with his assistant coaches at one point, but did the head coach really follow through or was he sending mixed signals?

One example: During the second week of the regular season, before the cracks in the foundation began to show up on the field in a lifeless 28-10 loss at Mississippi State, an academic adviser told Chizik there was a problem with one of his Auburn starters.

The adviser said the player wasn’t going to class, wasn’t doing his classwork, wasn’t making much of an effort at all in the classroom.

Chizik’s response: He told the adviser he didn’t believe him. That player started the Mississippi State game and struggled terribly, never showed much development on the field and eventually lost his starting job.

That’s how you go from 14-0 to 3-9 in two seasons, from winning all nine SEC games in 2010 to losing 10 straight games in the conference between 2011 and 2012, including all eight this season.

That’s how you spiral from winning the national championship to losing your job, as Chizik officially did Sunday, in record time.

One player at a time. One standard compromised after another.

Even an attempt to get a handle on discipline damaged player morale. Early this season, Auburn hired a private security firm to help enforce an 11 p.m. weeknight curfew. Older players living off-campus came to resent the measure because a representative of the security firm was supposed to see them enter their apartments before the curfew or knock and make sure they were in their rooms.

On one occasion, a player who’d arrived home before the security guard reacted to the guard’s knock for bed check by firing a shoe at the wall and warning the guard not to knock on his door again.

Hiring the security firm looked like a too-little, too-late overreaction to the star system that allowed Cam Newton and Mike Dyer to go their own way and do their own thing en route to that 2010 BCS title, a system that came to infect the entire program.

The program’s inner turmoil gained its first widespread attention two months after the BCS Championship victory when four players were arrested and charged with armed robbery. At the first trial of one of the accused - Antonio Goodwin was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in jail - two players, including Dyer, admitted to having smoked synthetic marijuana.

Unanswered questions remain. How widespread was that drug use, before and after the drug became illegal? When did Auburn coaches or officials become aware of it? What was done about it?

In hindsight, even the perfect season wasn’t perfect..

Consider how close Auburn came to losing multiple games in 2010 despite having Newton, the Heisman Trophy winner, at quarterback, Lombardi Trophy winner Nick Fairley at defensive tackle and a senior class of tough, hard-nosed football players signed and primarily developed by Tommy Tuberville and his staff.

Mississippi State had the ball on a final possession with a chance to win. Clemson missed an open receiver to win in overtime. It took a final drive and a field goal to beat Kentucky.

Arkansas led the Tigers in the fourth quarter. They were tied with LSU late in the fourth quarter. It took the greatest comeback in Iron Bowl history to overcome a 24-0 deficit at Alabama and a final drive - sparked by Dyer’s now-he’s-down, no-he-isn’t highlight run - to beat Oregon with a field goal at the buzzer.

Fully half of that BCS Championship team’s 14 wins were in doubt in the final quarter.

Newton, Fairley and the seniors received plenty of credit for the national title. So did offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn, whose attack set school and SEC records. People close to Chizik believe he felt slighted in the afterglow even though he deserved and earned praise for his steady hand as allegations of recruiting violations threatened Newton’s eligibility.

Chizik seemed to change after the national title. It’s not uncommon for coaches to write books after that kind of season, but his - “All In: What It Takes to Be the Best” - was far more about him than about the team.

On the field in 2011, Chizik began to assert himself more in the game plans, especially on offense, where he wanted Malzahn to slow down the offense to protect the defense. Chizik’s meddling combined with Malzahn’s desire to be a head coach led to Malzahn taking a pay cut to take over at Arkansas State. His 8-3 Red Wolves will play Saturday against Middle Tennessee for the Sun Belt title.

Auburn did manage to win ball-control defensive struggles against South Carolina and Florida last season, which helped reinforce Chizik’s belief that it was time to ditch the spread offense in favor of more of a pro style. After Malzahn left, Chizik completed the switch by hiring Scot Loeffler as offensive coordinator.

How did hiring a coach with one year’s experience as a coordinator, combined with Chizik’s continuing involvement in the offense, work out? Auburn scored 224 points in 12 games this season. During the 2010 regular season, the Tigers scored 499 points.

Bottom line: Chizik failed in terms of player discipline and player development. He failed in replacing valuable assistant coaches from Malzahn to defensive line coach Tracy Rocker. He failed to either spot the problems in his program or to adequately address them.

At the end of his tenure, Chizik is what a lot of people thought he was when Auburn hired him with his 5-19 record from Iowa State.

Nick Saban did eat him for breakfast, but Chizik himself set the table for his own dismissal.

---