Clemson and Auburn have an interesting rivalry that comes to the mini rivalry week of college football, but it is much more than the battle of I-85. If you are not familiar with this part of the country, please allow this writer to paint a picture for you. I-85 comes down from South Carolina through the untouched and undeveloped woods of Georgia where small towns surround Athens. You pass through Atlanta, and you drive on into the wilderness until you reach Auburn, Alabama. These two teams get a scenic view when they travel to play one another, but the game will be anything but scenic.
Bet on Clemson
The simple truth is that Auburn is not as good as Clemson. Clemson has shown that they have everything running perfectly after their national championship win, and they appear to be just fine even though they saw Deshaun Watson leave for the NFL. A team that is that strong will likely crush Auburn because Auburn is still looking for a quarterback. The difference in these teams seems to be a lack of leadership at the position.
Gus Malzahn
Gus Malzahn is coaching for his job, and he is in a position where he may lose his job if he does not win a couple games early in the season. He could be fired because the Auburn administration is tired of waiting for him to find someone who is capable of running his offense.
They must be looking at teams like Clemson and Alabama who always seem to find someone who can run the offense, and they may be tired of Malzahn acting like he is an offensive genius. He may well be very good, but he is failing while trying to manage the offense and run the program.
Dabo Swinney
Dabo is in the best position of any coach in the country.
He is at a school where they thought they might never win another national title, and he has a job for life because he just won that elusive title. They have not signed him to a lifetime contract, but one would believe that he can keep that job for as long as he wants. He has nothing to lose when playing Auburn, and he will likely look over to the Auburn Tigers and find that they are simply outmatched in every way.
He can test trick plays, and he can let his offense stop the Auburn offense in a way that could be the last straw for Auburn's administration. If Gus Malzahn gets fired, it will be because the Clemson Tigers made his offense look pathetic. This is an easy bet when you consider how good Clemson is, and we must wait to see how long Gus Malzahn will last at Auburn.
