Hugh Freeze commends Alex Golesh on retaining D.J. Durkin, hopes he retains locker room

During an exclusive interview with AuburnSports’ Justin Hokanson, former Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze offered some advice to new Auburn head coach Alex Golesh. After nearly three seasons at the helm, Freeze was let go following the Tigers’ 10-3 loss to Kentucky on Nov. 1. Golesh was announced as Auburn‘s new head coach on Nov. 30 after spending the past three seasons at USF.

One of Golesh’s first orders of business was retaining defensive coordinator D.J. Durkin, who was promoted to interim head coach following Freeze’s departure. Durkin had been floated as a potential candidate to fill the role full-time, but that did not come to fruition. Still though, he appears to be staying with the program on Golesh’s staff. Last season, Auburn‘s defense allowed just 329.2 yards per game (7th best in SEC).

“I don’t give a lot of advice unless the direct person asks me something,” Freeze said. “I think he’s already done one of the first couple of things I already told him to do, which is keep D.J. Durkin and Vontrell King-Williams. I wish he could keep all the staff, although I know that’s unrealistic. That’s just because I care about my guys, but I think you’ve got to play great defense in order to win games in this conference. I don’t know if people really know how hard it is to win in this conference now. It’s gotten, with everybody having money to go buy quarterbacks and some defensive linemen, it is a brutal, brutal way to win on Saturday’s. It’s hard, and it’s gonna get harder with nine games.“

Hugh Freeze hopes Alex Golesh can retain the locker room

Improvement was expected this season from Auburn after finishing with seven losses in back-to-back seasons, but that was not the case. After finishing with a 5-7 record, the Tigers missed bowl eligibility for the third time in four seasons. It will now be up to Golesh to return the program to its previous heights, which at the bare minimum, would be a bowl game appearance.

“Alex (Golesh), I don’t know him, but he retained D.J.,” Freeze continued. “I thought that was a priority because that will help retain the roster I would think, which is the second thing I’d say. The roster there has proven that it can compete. It’s a young roster. So, I don’t know if he does it or his general manager does it or how all that works. I don’t know how (National) Signing Day went today because I don’t keep up with anything, but we were set to sign a small class, but a good class and retain that locker room. I think he’s got the players there and obviously D.J. has proven that his system works in this league to stop teams enough.”

“And Alex is known for his offense, so I think there’s really not a lot of, he’s got to hire the right staff and all of that to make sure the culture is driven like he wants it to be driven. But, if he were to ask me (and he didn’t so I’m careful), I’d keep Vontrell and DJ and turn my attention to ‘how can I retain the roster and add the pieces to it you need?’ Retaining a lot of that roster would go a long way in helping them compete. That would be the advice.”