New Mexico State Review (AU 42 New Mexico State 7)

To be transparent and in the name of full disclosure, I must admit I did not nor have I yet watched the game. I was enduring a tortuous day of optometric lectures with topics such as: “Contact Lenses- Tales from the Trenches” and “Ocular Surface Disease” so my weekend was painfully boring. We did have several ODs in attendance wearing houndstooth and rooting for Troy over Tennessee however...imagine that.

I'm glad this team finally had the opportunity to taste success...chiefly because of the work involved to compete week in and week out and the disappointment of doing so in vain. But secondarily and selfishly, I've grown tired of writing columns about all that ails us, questioning effort, and playcalling, and personnel decisions, and the direction of the program as a whole. Even a coach or two were tired of reading it (and called me to voice their displeasure and refute my opinions). So...I'm utterly ecstatic to see this team walk off the field a winner.

Sure, we all have unanswered questions. We wonder, many of us aloud, what becomes of the staff, the athletic department, the current Auburn culture as we know it. We wonder if this team can find a way to be competitive against our biggest rivals. We wonder if the "powers that be" have what it takes to make tough decisions in the best interest of Auburn athletics.

Those questions and many more are best left unanswered in this column. For now, I'll enjoy the victory and be grateful for it. And I'll hope a small taste of success whets the appetite of a football team to play inspired football from here on out.

More important than Auburn football...go vote tomorrow. Have your voice heard. And if we're lucky, the result will foreshadow what occurs on the corner of Samford and Donahue. Sweeping change. Needed change. Someone that brings a record of success to the position. Someone that restores us to a position of excellence, of hope, of prosperity, of believers. We need it at Auburn and we need it from our president. Perhaps we'll get both.