AUBURN | All it took was one Louisiana Saturday night to change Auburn’s perspective on the rest of the 2021 season.
Going into the LSU game, Auburn was facing a potential 0-2 start in the SEC and perhaps 0-5 with the next four games against ranked opponents: Georgia, Arkansas Ole Miss and Texas A&M.
But a little Beaux Nix voodoo magic gave Auburn its first win in Tiger Stadium since 1999 and a much better outlook heading into the heart of conference play.
Sure, Georgia looks like it’s well on its way to competing for its first national championship since 1980, but the Razorbacks and Rebels were both soundly beaten over the weekend and the Aggies suffered an embarrassing home loss to Mississippi State.
What looked like a treacherous run of games just 48 hours ago, looks much more manageable now.
Auburn probably won’t beat Georgia Saturday but those players and coaches will certainly go into the game with confidence and we know what a difference a packed and loud Jordan-Hare Stadium can make.
The Tigers could, however, handle the following three opponents and head into a November run against Mississippi State and South Carolina at 4-1 in the conference. Auburn should be favored to win both, before hosting the Iron Bowl.
Now, I’d still be surprised if AU started 4-1 or 6-1 in the SEC. I’m expecting more of a roller coaster-type season, but that LSU win is a shot of adrenaline into this program, which is going to last for many weeks to come.
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In just five games, Bryan Harsin has already accomplished something his predecessor couldn’t in eight seasons and 103 games.
The win at LSU is the first for Auburn over one of its top three rivals — Alabama, Georgia or LSU — on the road since the 2010 Iron Bowl when Cam Newton helped rally AU from a 24-0 deficit.
It’s certainly a season-defining win and perhaps more. No matter how this season ends, winning in Baton Rouge and ending a 22-year losing streak is a huge accomplishment.
I don’t care that LSU is not an elite team right now. Neither is Auburn. What Harsin did in Tiger Stadium is special. He and his staff made the adjustments. They out-foxed the LSU staff.
That’s what a well coached team does — at least one that’s being built into a well coached team. It’s a process and Auburn is on its way under Harsin.
In many ways, Saturday night was the real start to the season and the Harsin era at Auburn.
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In today’s musical journey, we go back 58 years to the debut of one of the greatest guitarists and musicians of all time. On Oct. 4, 1963, a 17-year old Eric Clapton made his first public appearance with the Yardbirds at the Crawdaddy Club in Richmond, England. Clapton has gone on to sell over 280 million records in his career, which ranks among the top 60 artists of all time. He’s won 18 Grammy Awards and is the only three-time inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist and a member of the Yardbirds and Cream.
Eric Patrick Clapton was born in 1945 in Ripley, Surrey, England to a 16-year old mother and a 25-year old soldier. Clapton grew up believing that his grandmother, Rose, and her husband, Jack Clapp, were his parents and his mother was his older sister. His real mother eventually married a different soldier and moved to Canada leaving him to be raised by his grandparents. He received a guitar for his 13th birthday but it was a couple of years later before he started playing regularly, focusing mainly on blues music. He started out busking (performing on the street) before joining the Roosters for eight months in 1963 and then the Yardbirds. Clapton formed Cream in 1966, which he played in for two years, and then Blind Faith in 1968, which included Steve Windwood, and lasted a couple of more years before Clapton embarked on a solo career in 1970. His signature song, Layla, was composed in 1970 and performed with Derek and the Dominos. Clapton wrote the song about Pattie Boyd, who was married to his friend, Beatles guitarist George Harrison, at the time. She married Clapton in 1979 and they divorced 10 years later. Clapton’s 1974 cover of Bob Marley’s I Shot the Sheriff, 1977’s Wonderful Tonight and cover of Cocaine, 1991’s Tears in Heaven and 1996’s Change the World are among his biggest hits. Clapton has battled alcohol and drug addiction for most of his life.
The Yardbirds succeeded the Rolling Stones as the house band at the Crawdaddy Club. Clapton replaced original Yardbirds guitarist Anthony ‘Top’ Topham. He left the band abruptly in 1965 because he didn’t like their shift to pop rock and was replaced by Jeff Beck. Jimmy Page joined the band in 1966 giving the Yardbirds three of the top five guitarists of all time according to Rolling Stone magazine, which ranks Jimi Hendrix first, Clapton second, Page third, Keith Richards fourth and Beck fifth. The band had several hits during the 1960’s including For Your Love, Heart Full of Soul and Shapes of Things. After the Yardbirds broke up in 1968, Page formed Led Zeppelin.
