The school's sports teams are known as the Tigers, and they participate in the
NCAA's Division I-A athletics and in the Western Division of the 12-member Southeastern Conference (SEC). Auburn is very competitive
nationally in many sports in which it competes including football, baseball, women's basketball, and swimming & diving (men's
and women's).
Football
Auburn's football team, currently coached by Tommy Tuberville,
won a national championship in 1957. Two Auburn players, Bo Jackson in 1985, and
Pat Sullivan in 1971 have won the Heisman
Trophy. The Trophy's namesake, John Heisman, coached at Auburn
from 1895 until 1899. Auburn's Jordan-Hare Stadium has a
capacity of 87,451 ranking as the eighth-largest on-campus stadium in the NCAA as of August 2004. Auburn played the first
football game in the Deep South in 1892 against the University of Georgia at Piedmont Park in Atlanta, Georgia. The
Tigers' first bowl appearance was in 1937 in the Bacardi Bowl played in Havana, Cuba - the only college bowl game to ever be played outside the United States. As of 2004, AU Football has won six SEC
Conference Championships and five western division championships. Auburn plays arch-rival Alabama each year in a game known as the Iron
Bowl.Auburn completed the 2004 season with an unblemished 13-0 record, winning the SEC championship outright for the first time
since 1987. However, this achievement was somewhat overshadowed since the Tigers were left out of the BCS championship game in deference to two other undefeated
teams, USC and Oklahoma; the first undefeated SEC or BCS conference team to be
denied the opportunity to play for the championship.
Swimming and diving
In the last decade under head coach David Marsh, Auburn's swimming and diving program has become a virtual dynasty in the SEC and threatens to do the same nationally, with consecutive
NCAA championships for both the men and women in 2003 and 2004. The most recent championship marks the third in a row for the
women. The Auburn men have won the SEC Championship ten out of the last eleven years and have previous national championships in
1997 and 1999. Coach Marsh has been an US Olympic coach and AU swimmers have represented the US and several other countries in
recent Olympics. Auburn's most famous swimmer is Olympic gold medalist Rowdy Gaines winner of three gold medals at the 1984 Summer Olympics. Auburn's most successful female Olympic
swimmer is Kirsty Coventry (swimming for her home country of Zimbabwe) who won a gold, silver and bronze medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.
Women's basketball
The Auburn women's basketball team has been consistently competitive both
nationally and within the SEC. Despite playing in the same conference as perenial powerhouse Tennessee and other competitive programs such as Georgia and
Vanderbilt, Auburn has won four regular season SEC
championships and four SEC Tournament championships. AU has made sixteen appearances in the NCAA women's basketball tournament
and only once, in the Tigers first appearance in 1982, have the Tigers lost in the first round. Auburn played in three
consecutive National Championship games from 1988-1990 and won the Women's NIT in 2003. When Coach Joe Ciampi announced his retirement after twenty-five years at the end of the 2003-2004 season, the resulting
search snared the highly experienced, former Purdue and US
National and Olympic team head coach, Nell Fortner. Standout former Auburn players include; Ruthie
Bolton-Holyfield, Vickie Orr, Carolyn Jones, Chantel Tremitiere and Monique Morehouse.
Baseball
Auburn Baseball has won six SEC championships, three SEC Tournament championships, appeared in sixteen NCAA Regionals and
reached the College World Series (CWS) four times. After a
disappointing 2003-2004 season, former Auburn assistant-coach Tom Slater was named head coach. Samford Stadium-Hitchcock Field at
Plainsman Park is considered one of the finest facilities in college baseball and has a seating capacity of 4096 not including
lawn areas. In addition to Bo Jackson, Auburn has supplied several other stand-out players to Major League Baseball including Frank Thomas, Gregg Olson, Tim Hudson, and Mark Bellhorn.