Auburn Football retroactively claims seven additional national championships ahead of 2025 season

Before it takes its first snap in the 2025 college football season, Auburn went from a two-time national champion to a nine-time one. Tigers athletic director John Cohen confirmed plans for the Auburn football program to retroactively claim seven additional national championships ahead of the upcoming season, according to AuburnSports’ Justin Hokanson.

“For too long, Auburn has chosen a humble approach to our program’s storied history – choosing to recognize only Associated Press National Championships. Starting this fall, we have made the decision to honor the accomplishments of our deserving student-athletes, coaches, and teams from Auburn’s proud history,” Cohen told AuburnSports. “Our visible National Championship recognitions now align with the well-established standard used by the NCAA’s official record book and our peers across the nation.”

For years, the Tigers have proudly claimed Associated Press-awarded national championships in 1957 and 2010, along with three more in 1913, 1983 and 1993 that have long been acknowledged in the program’s media guide. Now, Auburn’s personal record books will also recognize four more national titles from 1910, 1914, 1958 and 2004 to give the football program nine total national championships.

Auburn’s 2004 team famously went a perfect 13-0, won the SEC championship and its Sugar Bowl game against No. 9 Virginia Tech (16-13) under former head coach Tommy Tuberville to finish No. 3 in the final AP poll. That same season, No. 1-ranked USC was named the BCS National Champion with a 55-19 win over No. 2 Oklahoma in a national title game that was later vacated due to NCAA violations by the Trojans. Utah also went undefeated in 2004, winning the Fiesta Bowl that season.

USC was forced to vacate its 2004 BCS National Championship as well as all wins from the 2005 season stemming from a NCAA investigation into impermissible benefits for both the Trojans football and men’s basketball programs that involved star running back Reggie Bush. Despite having the BCS title stripped away, the AP still recognized USC as its 2004 national champion. Bush also had his 2005 Heisman Trophy stripped away but it has since been reinstated by the Heisman Trust.

The Tigers were also recognized as national champions in 1910 (6-1, 5-0 SIAA) and 1914 (8-0-1, 4-0-1 SIAA) when it dominated the opposition, outscoring opponents by a combined score of 175-9 — losing 9-0 at Texas that season — and 193-0 in 1914 under then-coach Mike Donahue.

Fresh off a perfect 10-0 season in 1957, in which Ralph “Shug” Jordan‘s Tigers won its first SEC championship and was crowned national champions as the AP’s No. 1 team, Auburn’s 1958 team also went undefeated (9-0-1, 6-0-1 SEC) but missed out on playing for the national championship because LSU went a perfect 11-0 and was crowned both the SEC and AP national champion with a 7-0 win over Clemson in the Sugar Bowl that season.

Auburn is also updating its all-time list of conference championships, bringing its conference title tally to 15 with the additions of 1904, 1908 and 1910 titles when it participated in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association (SIAA).

The school reportedly plans to invite back and honor its new championship teams throughout the upcoming 2025 college football season, per Hokanson.