Alex Golesh's Auburn Identity Plans to Bring Back Program of Old

When asked this week about his team's identity, Auburn's Alex Golesh will look to follow the success of the best teams in program history.

Auburn Tigers head coach Alex Golesh says that his group can be like the best teams of previous seasons. | Jake Crandall/ Advertiser / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Auburn Tigers head coach Alex Golesh has understood the urgency to get back to the best cohort of SEC programs, and he laid it out this week. 

Speaking at the 33rd Annual First Light Community of Mobile football preview, he was asked about where he thinks the identity of his program will need to go to be successful in 2026. Responding with similar urgency to that of Tiger fans around the country, he believes they will have to find out in the first year. 

That’s where he’s seen success at previous programs, whether at Tennessee as its offensive coordinator or with USF as a former head coach. 

“We’ll find out this fall,” Golesh said on Tuesday. “I think for coming into year one, that’s the key.

This is my, I don’t know, sixth, seventh time being part of a year one, and the teams that have had success, at least in my experience, have been able to establish an identity really quickly.”

However, he has a major plan to make the program a success: bring back the Auburn football of old. The groups that dominated the country and the SEC had similar elements with each group. 

Now, Golesh wants to bring that back with hopes of contending in the conference. 

“It’s physical. It’s tough. It’s gritty. It’s blue-collar, and you can equate that a lot of different ways,” he said. “To me, it’s playing elite-level defense. It’s establishing the run, and it’s playing harder for four quarters than your opponent.”

Fortunately, his elite-level defense will be led by defensive coordinator DJ Durkin, who ended up as Auburn’s interim head coach after Hugh Freeze was fired in the middle of the season. The Tigers only allowed an average of 20.67 points per game, which was seventh in the conference last season.

But seeing a successful rush attack and earning victories are visual things that everyone can see. That’s the type of play that Golesh wants to see throughout his first year, as well as every year to come after 2026. 

I think your identity is something that the average fan can watch,” he said, “whether they’re at Jordan-Hare or they’re watching on TV and say, ‘Man, these dudes are physically and mentally tough. These dudes are connected. These dudes play really hard.’”

That will be the key for the Auburn head coach in his first season. Not only was that how the best Tiger coaches were able to win games, but he wants to bring that foundation back. 

“At the end of the day, that was established at Auburn way before me,” Golesh said, “and it’ll be the same way after me, and it’s us getting back to that.”

He does say that his team is “fighting like crazy” to bring that identity back, an optimistic sign for a program that is rallying around its new head coach. Playing as a team will do that, with Golesh not saying how great his “roster” is. 

Football is a team sport, after all. 

“This is the greatest game there is,” Golesh said.  “You need 115 dudes and, I don’t know how many staff members we got, over a hundred, all on the same page to win a football game.”