Auburn Football 2011: October Schedule Will Leave Tigers Shining or Stinking

The reigning national champions will have a long way to go in order to replicate last season’s success. They return only four starters on offense, including only one offensive lineman, while the defense has five returners.

That’s a putrid level of experience that will almost undoubtedly ruin any high-level bowl aspirations for the Tigers.

But perhaps what’s even more ghastly is their October schedule, which goes as follows: at South Carolina, at Arkansas, against Florida, at LSU and at Ole Miss.

That’s as brutal a stretch of games as any in the entire country and it all comes with no bye week either prior or during.

How well the Tigers do in that stretch will go a long way in determining the success of the entire season.

There are only four games that can be penciled in as wins: Utah State, Florida Atlantic, Ole Miss and Samford. At Clemson and at Georgia are two tough places to play and with no “Lights, Camera, Cam,” Auburn likely won’t be able to squeak out wins on the road like they did last year.

Michael Dyer is a fantastic running back, but with four new starters on the line he won’t be able to carry the team past the staunch defenses of South Carolina, Florida and LSU. However, he may be able to outscore Arkansas without Knile Davis.

Auburn brought in a great recruiting class, but it takes a lot longer than a year for freshmen to adjust to playing college football, especially in the SEC. Some freshmen could turn out to be phenomenal, but that won’t be enough in the brutal SEC West.

This entire team is built around speculation, so it’s completely pointless to debate who looks better in the preseason because there are a lot of teams that look great. But that is exactly what happened last year and they won the national championship.

The second week of the season the Tigers play Mississippi State, and if they can win or at least look like a polished team in the second week, things will be looking up. Without defensive coordinator Manny Diaz, however, the Bulldogs are also pretty unknown.

Clemson brings in top recruiting classes every year but does nothing with them, so who knows how much a win in Death Valley would really mean?

The real Auburn team will show its colors on the road against an experienced and talented South Carolina. If the Tigers can just put up a valiant fight, the future could be bright for the rest of the all-important month of October and consequently for the rest of their season.

If not—well, there’s always next year.