BMatt’s Monday musings

AUBURN | You might view the upheaval on Auburn’s coaching staff over the past week as a negative.

You’d be wrong.

It’s exactly what I expected and what Hugh Freeze needs to do moving forward.

Auburn is by far the biggest and most complex job in Freeze’s coaching career. it also comes during one of the most transformative eras of college football with the advent of the transfer portal and NIL collectives.

There was no way for Freeze to completely prepare for all the challenges his first year at Auburn would bring. It was always going to be a learning experience.

Freeze made the right choice in trying to hire an offensive coordinator to run that side of the ball. It never quite worked out on the field with Philip Montgomery but off the field, Freeze led AU’s recruiting efforts in landing a heralded top 10 class.

There was not a more important goal for Freeze to reach in year one.

With Freeze planning to take a bigger role in the offense including calling plays in year two, he’ll need to balance out his schedule more and rely on his staff including his coordinators to take on more recruiting responsibilities.

I’d be surprised if his two new coordinator hires don’t come with higher recruiting acumens.

There are other adjustments that will need to be made including his approach to the transfer portal, which has brought limited returns so far.

If Freeze can reach his next recruiting goal and bring in a top five class in 2025 along with a higher-rated group of transfers, the Tigers should be much better equipped to compete for a spot in the 12-team playoff in his third year.

That will be a key for Freeze. While recruiting and off-field gains are vital for Auburn’s program, there also needs to be on-field improvement too or the pressure will build fast.

Florida’s Billy Napier is a prime example.

The Gators were on track to sign a top five class a couple of months ago before a second-consecutive losing season and a lot of talk about Napier being on the hot seat saw UF slide to No. 19 in the team recruiting rankings.

Napier is going into his third year but he inherited a much stronger program at UF than Freeze did at AU after two disastrous years under Bryan Harsin.

I think Freeze has an extra year before things could potentially heat up, but I don’t think he’ll need it.

One of Freeze’s greatest strengths is being able to see things for how they are. That ability to self-assess and make adjustments is vital for Freeze to navigate through all the current and coming changes in college football.

He’s had the opportunity to learn a lot over the last 13 and a half months. Those lessons should pay dividends in the months and years to come.

***

It’s easy to forget that Bruce Pearl was a combined 26-40 in his first two seasons at Auburn.

Now, he’s second on Auburn’s all-time win list and should be considered one of AU’s all-time best coaches regardless of sports.

Saturday’s 93-78 victory over LSU gave Pearl 187 wins in his 10th season at Auburn, which surpasses Cliff Ellis and is just behind Joel Eaves’ 213.

At his current pace, Pearl will become AU’s all-time winningest men’s basketball coach next season.

He’s already won two of AU’s five SEC regular season championships, one of the two SEC Tournament championships and led the Tigers to their only Final Four in 2019.

He could very well add to that list of accomplishments with this year’s team and he’s signed two more very talented players for next year.

Pearl and his staff have also proven to be very adept in securing talent through the transfer portal and he’s turned Neville Arena into one of the best home courts in college basketball.

It’s unbelievable how much Auburn basketball has transformed under Pearl. And there’s no sign of him slowing down.

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In today’s musical journey, we go back 43 years to the day a pop musician used a paint can and brush as a prop during a concert to send a message to his ex-wife. On Jan. 15, 1981, Phil Collins sang “In The Air Tonight” during an appearance on the British music chart T.V. show Top of the Pops. While Collins denies it, his first wife, Andrea Bertorelli, believes the paint can and brush refer to a brief affair she had with a painter. He used a can of red paint as a prop on a subsequent appearance on Top of the Pops, adding further evidence to Bertorelli’s theory. The pair were married from 1975 to 1980 and according to Bertorelli, the divorce was because of his infidelity, which was not contested. Shortly after Bertorelli told him of the affair, Collins wrote “In The Air Tonight,” which has become his signature song. It was released from his debut solo album in January 1981 and climbed to the top five of the charts in many countries. It only reached No. 19 on the Billboard 100 in the U.S., but became very popular in the coming years making memorable appearances in the movie, Risky Business, and on the popular T.V. show, Miami Vice. The song was ranked No. 35 on VH1’s list of the 100 Greatest Songs of the 1980’s and No. 291 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It’s also well known for Collins’ use of the gated reverb drum sound.

Phillip David Charles Collins was born in 1951 in south London. His father was an insurance agent and mother a theatrical agent. He began playing drums at age five when he was given a toy drum set for Christmas. He formed his first band, the Real Thing, at age 12, which included Bertorelli as a backup singer. He dropped out of school at age 14 and had several stage and film appearances before rejoining the music scene and playing in several bands. In 1970, he answered an advertisement in a music magazine to tryout as a drummer for Genesis and was hired. He played drums and was used primarily as a backup singer until 1975 when Peter Gabriel left the band and they turned to Collins as the lead singer. The change was a success with their next album producing their first Billboard 100 top 10 single in “Follow You Follow Me.” Collins began his solo career in 1981 and had his first No. 1 single with “Against All Odds” from the movie of the same name. His third solo album, 1985’s No Jacket Required, included several big hits including No. 1 singles “One More Night” and “Sussudio,” which was ranked No. 2 on a list of the worst No. 1 songs of all-time by Best Classic Bands. The album won three Grammy awards including Album of the Year. Collins had four more No. 1 singles in 1985’s “Separate Lives,” 1988’s “Two Hearts” and “Groovy Kind Of Love,” and 1989’s “Another Day In Paradise.” Collins produced eight studio albums and appeared in 10 movies and a few T.V. shows including Miami Vice. He has sold over 150 million solo albums worldwide and joins Paul McCartney snd Michael Jackson as the only artists to sell over 100 million albums both with a band and as a solo artist. Collins has eight Grammy Awards, was inducted in the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Genesis in 2010.