The vibes surrounding Auburn football are high ahead of the 2026 season as Alex Golesh takes over the program, which has been absent from postseason play the last two seasons.
Experts across the country believe Auburn football will return to bowl season in 2026, but two from ESPN have differing opinions on how much the Tigers will improve this season.
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ESPN’s Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach return to make weekly bowl projections and have released their debut forecast for the 2026 season. Both experts expect Auburn to earn a bowl bid, but neither is high on Auburn playing in a prestigious bowl game or even making the College Football Playoff.
Bonagura’s first projection pits Auburn against TCU in the Kinder’s Texas Bowl, which is scheduled for New Year’s Eve at Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas. The Horned Frogs were a solid program in 2025, going 8-4 in the regular season and earning an overtime win over USC in the Alamo Bowl. TCU opened its campaign by upsetting North Carolina in Chapel Hill, 48-14, spoiling the home opener for NFL head coach legend Bill Belichick.
Schlabach is less optimistic in Auburn, as he projects the Tigers to stay in their home state this postseason to face Duke in the JLab Birmingham Bowl at Protective Stadium on Tuesday, Dec. 29. Duke upset the Virginia Cavaliers last season to win the ACC Championship, which kept them out of the College Football Playoff. The Blue Devils defeated Arizona State at the Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl in El Paso, capping a four-game winning streak to end the season.
Auburn football is looking to change its fate in 2026 after ending each of the last five seasons with seven losses and appearing in just three bowl games since 2020. Alex Golesh hopes to lead the Tigers to a high-profile bowl game such as the Citrus Bowl, but earning a bid to any bowl will be viewed as a positive for Auburn in year one of the Golesh era.
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This article originally appeared on Auburn Wire: ESPN predicts Auburn football to end postseason drought in 2026
