HOOVER — When you win a national championship, you have to expect the subsequent offseason is going to be manic.

All the interviews, appearances, signings, banquets, tours, parades, birthday parties … whatever … snatching up frequent flyer miles and hotel reward points like the candy from a busted piñata.

Everything except the actual game is dissected, discussed and analyzed. Over and over. For months and months.

Such is the life of a national champion. Such is the life of the coach who leads his team to the crystal ball.

But when Gene Chizik stepped off that 747 in Montgomery on Jan. 11, there’s no way he could have predicted or planned what his offseason away from the game would be like.

No one could.

Some really good and cool things happened: a book release, countless appearances on national media outlets, well-wishers from coast to coast, a trip to the White House and a pretty big raise and contract extension.

Some not-so-good things also happened: five players arrested and kicked off the team, an HBO report, and, oh yeah, the never-ending “what-ifs” from a still-open NCAA investigation.

As head of the Auburn football family, Chizik has had a lot to deal with over the last six months. He’s had a lot of late, late nights.

But, Auburn’s third-year head coach says (a lot) that when he does get to bed, he sleeps like a baby.

“I feel really good about the direction of the program and how we run it and what we do,” Chizik said Thursday at SEC Media Days. “As I’ve said again, many times, I put my head on my pillow at night and I sleep really well. So I’m very confident in the direction of what we’re trying to do and where we’re going.”

Spend any time around Chizik and you realize two things. First, he plays it close to the leather jacket and second, he’s focused on his job. And not much else.

When most coaches say they don’t read the newspaper, it’s just something they say. Most coaches do read the newspaper. But when Chizik says he doesn’t read, listen to or worry about reports, rumors and/or the Boogie Man, you believe him.

It’s just the way he’s wired.

“If we all functioned in our lives about what everybody thought and everybody’s opinion and we address speculation and we address rumors and all those things, we’d probably spend our whole life doing it,” Chizik said.

He doesn’t have that much time. He’d rather worry about Auburn and what it’s going to take to keep the Tigers on top of the college football mountain, which is going to be particularly tough this year with that schedule and a roster full of young, inexperienced players.

His players have followed suit.

Forget what happens off the playing field or outside the athletic complex, they’re not interested in hearing or talking about it.

That new $16 million indoor facility kind of looks like a bubble, you know.

It’s business as usual for the 2011 Tigers.

“We’re going to get better each and every day, and that’s the only thing we’re concerned with and that’s what we’re tying to do,” defensive end Nosa Eguae said.
Sound familiar?

“It’s not something that I can control,” said wide receiver Emory Blake, “so it’s not something I’m going to worry about.”

Even if most everyone else is.
MIKE SZVETITZ is sports editor of the Opelika-Auburn News. He may be reached at or 737-2513.