Hugh Freeze has agreed to a deal to become Auburn’s next head football coach, the school announced Monday.
Auburn administrators, including athletic director John Cohen, met with football staff members earlier in the day to tell them about Freeze’s hiring. They were planning to meet with the players at 6 p.m. ET, and Freeze was scheduled to arrive on campus later Monday evening, sources told ESPN.
“After a thoughtful, thorough, and well-vetted search, we ended where we started, with Hugh Freeze,” Cohen said in a news release. “Of all the candidates we considered, Hugh was the best fit. Fit has several meanings, but the most important factors were student-athlete development, football strategy, recruiting and SEC experience.”
Freeze’s contract with Auburn is six years at an average of $6.5 million per year, sources told ESPN’s Pete Thamel.
Freeze has spent the past four seasons at Liberty, where he took the Flames to unprecedented heights. He’s widely regarded as one of the top offensive minds in the game. This will be Freeze’s second head-coaching stint in the SEC, as he led Ole Miss’ program from 2012 to 2016. He beat Alabama and Nick Saban in back-to-back seasons in 2014 and 2015 and capped the 2015 season with the Rebels’ first Sugar Bowl victory since 1970.
“First, I want to acknowledge Cadillac Williams for the incredible job he did as interim head coach,” Freeze said in the release. “The impact he made is immeasurable and cannot be overstated. Secondly, Auburn is one of the preeminent programs in college football and I’m very appreciative of President [Chris] Roberts and John Cohen for this opportunity at Auburn.
“I’ve been fortunate to witness first-hand how special Auburn is during my time as a head coach in the SEC and while visiting my daughter Jordan who attended Auburn and currently lives in the community. I can’t wait to work with our student-athletes and the Auburn family to bring championships back to the Plains.”
In the weeks leading up to the start of Ole Miss’ preseason practice in 2017, Freeze resigned after Ole Miss officials discovered he had made a series of calls to multiple numbers associated with an escort service. Ole Miss was placed on NCAA probation in 2017 for violations that occurred in part under Freeze, and the sanctions included a two-year bowl ban.
Freeze, while cited by the NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions for failure to monitor his assistant coaches and the school’s boosters, did not receive a show-cause penalty and “promoted an atmosphere of compliance,” according to the NCAA report.
New Auburn athletic director Cohen, who was hired Oct. 31, had narrowed his search to Ole Miss’ Lane Kiffin and Freeze. Kiffin said Saturday that he was staying at Ole Miss and signing a new deal worth $9 million per year.
Freeze, 53, replaces Bryan Harsin, who was fired Oct. 31, two days after Auburn’s 41-27 loss to Arkansas at home. Harsin was 9-12 overall in less than two seasons at Auburn, which experienced repeated struggles on offense under him and had difficulty sustaining success on the recruiting trail. Former athletic director Allen Greene, who hired Harsin, negotiated a settlement with the university to leave in August. Greene was entering the final five months of his contract, and sources told ESPN his deal was not going to be renewed after the season.
Harsin looked as if he might be out after Year 1 and survived a university-directed investigation in January after a mass exodus of players and assistant coaches. He was retained after then-school president Jay Gogue said the process “did not yield information that should change the status of our coaching staff or football program.” Harsin came to Auburn from Boise State and had never previously coached in the SEC. He finished 4-11 against Power 5 opponents at Auburn.
Auburn owes Harsin a $15.5 million buyout, and 50% of that is due within 30 days of his termination.
Freeze agreed to a new eight-year deal at Liberty in October with an average salary of just under $5 million annually, making him one of the highest-paid Group of 5 coaches in the country. Liberty football accomplished several firsts on Freeze’s watch, including its first AP national ranking and the program’s first wins over an ACC and an SEC school.
Freeze becomes Auburn’s third head coach in the past four years. Gus Malzahn, currently at UCF, was fired at the end of the 2020 season. Harsin lasted parts of two seasons before being fired. The Tigers last won an SEC championship in 2013, Malzahn’s first season as head coach; they also played in the BCS title game that season, losing to Florida State.
In the past 12 seasons, Auburn has won a national championship (2010) and played for one (2013). Only five other schools in college football can make that claim during that span — Alabama, Clemson, Georgia, LSU and Ohio State.
Hockey fans often hear about the dreaded Stanley Cup hangover, when a team falters in the season after their championship. But a Presidents’ Trophy hangover?
Last season, the New York Rangers finished on top of the regular-season standings. This season, it’s looking less likely by the day that they’ll even make the playoffs.
When play begins Monday, the Rangers will be six points behind the Montreal Canadiens for the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference. With only six games left, they’ll need to come close to running the table, and will also need help from Montreal’s opponents.
Monday’s game is home against the Tampa Bay Lightning (7 p.m. ET, ESPN+). The Lightning have clinched a berth but will still be playing hard as they have a chance to catch the Toronto Maple Leafs for the top spot in the Atlantic Division.
As noted, New York will need to gin up a winning streak here to bolster its chances. As for the Canadiens, they close out with a somewhat easier schedule: home against the Detroit Red Wings, at the Ottawa Senators and Maple Leafs, then home for the Chicago Blackhawks and the Hurricanes.
So that’s the task ahead for the Blueshirts. Will they come through?
With the regular season ending April 17, we’ll help you track it all with the NHL playoff watch. As we traverse the final stretch, we’ll provide details on all the playoff races, along with the teams jockeying for position in the 2025 NHL draft lottery.
Points: 83 Regulation wins: 27 Playoff position: N/A Games left: 5 Points pace: 88.4 Next game: @ DAL (Tuesday) Playoff chances: 1.4% Tragic number: 2
Points: 74 Regulation wins: 23 Playoff position: N/A Games left: 6 Points pace: 79.8 Next game: vs. EDM (Monday) Playoff chances: 0% Tragic number: E
Points: 72 Regulation wins: 27 Playoff position: N/A Games left: 5 Points pace: 76.7 Next game: @ LA (Monday) Playoff chances: 0% Tragic number: E
Points: 50 Regulation wins: 14 Playoff position: N/A Games left: 6 Points pace: 54.0 Next game: vs. CGY (Monday) Playoff chances: 0% Tragic number: E
Note: An “x” means that the team has clinched a playoff berth. An “e” means that the team has been eliminated from playoff contention.
Race for the No. 1 pick
The NHL uses a draft lottery to determine the order of the first round, so the team that finishes in last place is not guaranteed the No. 1 selection. As of 2021, a team can move up a maximum of 10 spots if it wins the lottery, so only 11 teams are eligible for the No. 1 pick. Full details on the process are here. Matthew Schaefer, a defenseman for the OHL’s Erie Otters, is No. 1 on the draft board.
The Utah Hockey Club will open a new practice and training facility for team use on Sept. 1, the team announced Monday.
The 115,780-square-foot facility, built on the southeastern end of a Sandy shopping mall, will house two NHL standard ice sheets. It will also include training, medical and dining facilities as well as team locker rooms.
Building a practice facility quickly was one of the immediate challenges Utah owner Ryan Smith faced in bringing an NHL team to the Beehive State. The Utah Olympic Oval, which is primarily used for speedskating events, served as the team’s practice facility this season, but it was intended to be only a temporary solution.
“We want to be competitive in the NHL, and to do that you got to have a place where these guys can practice and they can recover, and it’s home,” Smith said. “We did a miraculous job with the Oval, but at the same time that’s not this.”
Players on Utah’s roster had input on the practice facility’s design from the dining areas to the locker rooms. The facility incorporates many of their suggestions.
“We tried to involve them as much as we can in every part of this,” Smith said.
Utah’s practice facility will also be ready for public use next January. It will feature event venues, eight community locker rooms, equipment rentals and a team store. The ice rinks will be available to the public when not in use by the team.
MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin has congratulated Alex Ovechkin for setting an “outstanding record” as the NHL’s top career goal scorer.
In a message after Ovechkin’s 895th career goal broke a tie for the record with Wayne Gretzky in the Washington Capitals‘ game Sunday against the New York Islanders, Putin said the achievement was something Russians would celebrate.
“I congratulate you on your outstanding record. You have surpassed legendary masters in the number of goals scored in National Hockey League regular-season games,” Putin said in a statement released by the Kremlin on Monday.
Breaking Gretzky’s record “has become not only your personal success, but also a real celebration for fans in Russia and abroad,” Putin added. “I wish you health, good fortune [and] fighting spirit to conquer new heights in life and in sports.”
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Putin and Ovechkin had not yet spoken by phone but that Putin’s message of congratulations showed the president “highly values Ovechkin’s sporting result.”
Ovechkin has been a backer of Putin in the past and in 2017 set up a group called Putin Team on social media to show support for the Russian president, who was reelected the following year.
At the time, Ovechkin told The Associated Press and The Washington Post, “I just support my country,” and said, “It’s not about political stuff.”
Russian Sports Minister Mikhail Degtyarev referred to that moment in his own statement of congratulations after Ovechkin broke the record Sunday.
He posted on social media that Ovechkin “remains a member of the Putin team and at the same time one of the main faces of world hockey, a favorite of millions and the NHL top scorer.”