Dunn: AU ready to get going

July 26, 2006

Jason Bowen
The Daily Sentinel

Don Dunn is ready for the 2006 football season to get started.

The Auburn defensive tackles coach shared his enthusiasm with close to 100 people who share that same sentiment Monday night at the Jackson County Auburn Club meeting at the Goose Pond Civic Center.

Dunn was the keynote speaker for the club’s July meeting, which serves as a kickoff of sorts for the upcoming football season.

“It’s kind of crunch time right now,” Dunn told The Daily Sentinel in an interview following the meeting.

“Everybody’s getting anxious, getting excited, getting nervous, all those emotions. We’re ready to get going.”

Expectations are high for the 2006 Tigers. Auburn has been getting high praise from college football analysts and pre-season magazines.

Dunn told the audience that the compliments are nice, but that they won’t come in handy come game time.

“It’s all about production. I always tell the players not to believe everything they see or hear. We’ve got to produce on the field,” he said.

Dunn spoke with excitement about Auburn’s schedule — the Tigers have home games against the likes of LSU, Florida, Georgia, Washington State and make the trip to Tuscaloosa to face archrival Alabama — and the improvements being made to Jordan-Hare Stadium.

Dunn promised the local Auburn fans that they wouldn’t be disappointed in new defensive coordinator Will Muschamp, who won a national championship will serving in that same role at LSU in 2003 and was the defensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins in 2005.

“You’re going to be excited about Will Muschamp,” Dunn told the crowd. “He’s a hard-nosed and loves the game. We will probably be a lot more aggressive on defense and do a lot more blitzing than we have the past few years.”

“I think (Auburn head) coach (Tommy) Tuberville did a great job of finding him.”

Auburn is coming off a 9-3 season, and the Tigers were 13-0 and finished second in the country in 2004.

Dunn said the Auburn football program is still feeling the beneficial effects of the unbeaten season two years ago.

“It helps with everything — confidence, winning, attitude, committment,” he said. “You can’t buy those sort of things.”