The Auburn Tigers are set to start their 2023 campaign on Saturday when they host the UMass Minutemen (1-0) in Jordan-Hare Stadium.
UMass is led by head coach Don Brown who is in his second tenure with the program. He coached them from 2004-08 before leaving to become a defensive coordinator at Maryland. He spent time at Michigan and Arizona before making his return ahead of the 2022 season.
The Minutemen looked to have improved from a rough first season when they went 1-11 but suffered some competitive losses. They beat New Mexico State 41-30 to open the 2023 season and gave Auburn some film to study. That film was revealing to [autotag]Hugh Freeze[/autotag], who faced them last season as the head coach at Liberty.
“Well, I played them every year,” Freeze said on Monday. “I saw a drastic improvement last year under Coach (Don) Brown. I have great respect for him. I think he is one of the best defensive play callers in the country. Last year their record was atrocious, and they had a top 10 defense in the country. Now they have added 27 transfers, most from Power 5 schools. I thought they looked quite different. New Mexico State is not an easy place to go play, and they took care of the football and did not turn it over. They got turnovers. They capitalized on turnovers. They threw the ball effectively, which they have not done in four years that I’ve played them. I think defensively they play just as hard as any team in the country, and you combine that with Coach Brown’s systems, which are very chaotic and very hard to identify where your offense is at times. They will create negative plays with that. That was a big challenge for us last year when we played them up at UMass. They created a lot of negative plays against us. We managed to score enough points to win the game, but it was a challenge. They have our full attention.”
They were led by transfer quarterback Taisun Phommachanh who is capable of hurting Auburn through the air as well as when he tucks the ball and runs. Phommachanh is one of six Minutemen that you need to know ahead of the game and here is a look at these key players.