Auburn Football: How the Tigers Can Salvage Their Season

AUBURN, Ala. — Three days after his team's goals of repeating as SEC champions and finishing "13 seconds better" by claiming a national title it came close to winning last season officially came to an end, Auburn head coach Gus Malzahn made a guarantee.

The Tigers may be out of the big races following an embarrassing 34-7 loss to rival Georgia, but they won't end the 2014 season with a whimper.

"The true champions and the true winners rebound," Malzahn said during his Tuesday press conference, which you can watch below via AL.com. "They come back and they bounce back and that’s been our message... We’re disappointed and we should be, but that’s behind us. It is what it is, and we have to find a way the next two weeks to finish this thing strong.

"We will finish this thing strong, there’s no doubt."

Auburn has posted three losses in its five games, including back-to-back defeats to Texas A&M and Georgia that took the Tigers from a potential playoff bid to 10 spots away in the latest rankings. 

It has been a crushing late-season collapse, especially for a team with national championship hopes and hype through the first few weeks. 

But, since the final whistle sounded last Saturday night in Sanford Stadium, the tone for Auburn's coaches and players has been one of determination, even though they will not be celebrating any sort of conference or national championship this winter.

"Last week was very disappointing, and this week was very disappointing," offensive coordinator Rhett Lashlee said. "It's all about how you respond. As coaches, we've got to respond well if we want our players to respond well. We still have plenty to play for."

As silly as it may sound by looking at the schedule, "plenty to play for" starts this weekend with the Tigers' final home game—a matchup with FCS opponent Samford.

After a weekend where nothing went right in all three phases of the game, a comfortable victory against the lower-division Bulldogs could give Auburn the momentum it desperately needs.

"Right now we just have to get better," defensive coordinator Ellis Johnson said. "That would be a by-product that hopefully will happen... Our starters and our rotators need to play well first, and have a good week of practice."

Following this Saturday night's game at Jordan-Hare Stadium, Auburn should be 8-3, giving the Tigers at least 20 wins in the two seasons following the 3-9 debacle of 2012.

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"I think that's a huge accomplishment," senior tight end C.J. Uzomah said. "I don't think that's been done in the history of college football. We're looking at this one week at a time."

And then would come the true meaning of "plenty to play for"—a trip to Tuscaloosa to play new No. 1 Alabama in the Iron Bowl.

The Tigers can't get back to Atlanta with a great chance at a playoff berth, but they could prevent their biggest rivals from getting there and set themselves up for double digits in the win column.

Even with Auburn's grueling 2014 schedule and late-season disappointments, 10 wins would mark the best "second season" following a big turnaround in the last couple of decades:

School	Pre-Turnaround	Turnaround	Post-Turnaround
South Carolina	0-11 (1999)	8-4 (2000)	9-3 (2001)
Ole Miss	3-9 (2007)	9-4 (2008)	9-4 (2009)
Auburn	3-9 (2012)	12-2 (2013)	7-3* (2014)
Miami (OH)	1-11 (2009)	10-4 (2010)	4-8 (2011)
Hawaii	0-12 (1998)	9-4 (1999)	3-9 (2000)

"It's not what our goal was," Uzomah said. "That's not what our aspirations were. But at the same time, we do that and we win our bowl game, that's another 10-win season... Going forward, we're looking for three more wins."

But before Auburn can get its sights set on knocking off a red-hot Crimson Tide team and turning around a bad finish to 2014, there are plenty of problems that need to be fixed against Samford.

"We just have to address [the problems] in this upcoming week and make sure we can still salvage this season," Uzomah said. "We can't look past Samford, and we need to come into Alabama with a vengeance."

All quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. All recruiting rankings and information courtesy of 247Sports. All stats courtesy of cfbstats.com.

Justin Ferguson is Bleacher Report's lead Auburn writer. Follow him on Twitter @JFergusonAU.