Hugh Freeze's Daughter Sounds Off on Auburn Fans: 'We Were Promised Four Years'

Athletics director John Cohen and the Auburn Tigers fired former head football coach Hugh Freeze early Sunday afternoon, but the ‘Freeze’ name hasn’t disappeared from fans’ minds and social media feeds.

Madi Freeze, Hugh’s daughter, released a video on her TikTok page on Monday to discuss her father’s recent firing and the “reality” for families who are forced to deal with the negative repercussions of the coaching profession.

The video lasted over five minutes, and the caption said, “full transparency today… praying for the many families in this industry who are walking through this.”

“People can say what they want about money – ‘go and live your life and get paid, whatever, blah blah blah.’ That’s just not how it is,” Madi Freeze said. “There’s not enough money that can make you feel like this was worth it or you wanted this to happen.”

“Obviously, we came here hoping to restore a program, and we were promised four years,” she continued. “And that didn’t happen. There’s frustration, there’s hurt, and more than anything, I hurt for my dad, who loved the people in that building. It’s devastating that they will carry on without him.”

Madi Freeze continued by acknowledging her father’s health, which she says has considerably worsened over the last three years with the cancer diagnosis.

“In some twisted way, there’s a relief factor for me personally because I’ve watched my dad’s health just deteriorate over this. Other people can see it, I know y’all can see it, he’s not healthy,” Madi Freeze said as a text caption reading “as y’all boo him out of the stadium” appeared on the screen. “I’m thankful there’s a relief of my dad finally gets to have the surgeries that he needs, and those are scheduled. He’s going to get healthy.”

She started questioning her faith and the entire purpose of why the Freeze family was brought to the Plains in the first place, and then claimed that the program needed more than a few years to reach the competitive level that fans expect from the Tigers.

“There’s just the question of ‘God, why did you ever bring us here? Why? Why?’” Madi Freeze added. “... I get that people didn’t see the results that they wanted in three years, but we all knew that this was going to be much longer than a three-year rebuild.”

Hugh Freeze went 15-19 overall during his two and a half seasons at Auburn, including 6-16 in SEC play and 1-12 against ranked opponents. And despite the Tigers boasting one of the more talented rosters in the league, Freeze and company simply couldn’t figure out how to win games.

A common saying around town is “if you love Auburn, Auburn will love you back.” Well, according to Madi Freeze, her family didn’t exactly get to experience that.

“We loved Auburn, and the second we got here, everybody was very adamant that ‘if you love Auburn, then it will love you back.’ Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case for us.”

In the closing seconds of the video, she recited a sermon that she had heard over the past few days and applied it to her family’s situation, insinuating that many Auburn fans need to stop being hateful and possibly rethink their spiritual foundations.

“I heard this in a sermon last week. The Lord says that ‘they’ve hated you, but they hated me first.’ And I’ve really clung to that… someone that’s praying over my family had a really good comment to make that we don’t wish bad upon them, but we do hope that they turn to the Lord and find Jesus.”

Madi Freeze posted a “part two” video to clarify the comments she originally made, but has since deleted both videos from her TikTok page.