2008 Auburn Tigers football team The 2008 Auburn Tigers football team represented Auburn University during 2008 NCAA Division I FBS football season . Tommy Tuberville served his tenth and final season as head coach at Auburn . He was joined by a new defensive coordinator Paul Rhoads and new offensive coordinator Tony Franklin , who attempted to implement his spread offense in a failed effort to correct the Tigers ' offensive struggles in 2007 . Tuberville fired Franklin six games into the season . Auburn played a seven - game home schedule at Jordan – Hare Stadium , while traveling to Mountaineer Field in Morgantown , West Virginia for the Tigers ' first ever meeting with the West Virginia Mountaineers . The Tennessee Volunteers returned to the Tigers ' schedule for the first time since Auburn defeated Tennessee twice in AU ' s undefeated 2004 season . LSU , Arkansas , and Georgia rounded out Auburn ' s home conference schedule . Pre - Season . Rankings . The Tigers entered the season with high expectations , ranked highly by multiple polls in the preseason . The Associated Press Poll placed Auburn at # 10 while the USA Today Coaches ' Poll , a component of the Bowl Championship Series rankings , had Auburn at # 11 . Other rankings include : < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 7 – Rivals . com < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 8 – Athlon < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 9 – Sports Illustrated < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 9 – CollegeTop25 Consensus < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 10 – ESPN < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 13 – Lindy ' s < br > < nowiki > # < / nowiki > 14 – CollegeFootballNews / Scout . com Pre - season All - SEC Teams . Coaches All - SEC 1st Team – DT Sen ’ Derrick Marks & P Ryan Shoemaker < br > Coaches All - SEC 2nd Team – RB Ben Tate , OL Tyronne Green , LB Tray Blackmon & DB Jerraud Powers < br > Coaches All - SEC 3rd Team – DE Antonio Coleman Schedule . Auburn ' s schedule consisted of eight Southeastern Conference opponents ( four home , four away ) and four non - conference opponents . AU meets Tennessee - Martin and West Virginia for the first time . The WVU game , a mid - season inter - conference Thursday night matchup , is the first of a two game home - and - home series between the two teams . Of the remaining ten opponents that the Tigers have previously faced , Auburn holds the all - time series lead against all but Alabama and LSU . Four opponents — # 1 Georgia , LSU , West Virginia and Tennessee — were ranked in both the preseason USA Today and AP Polls . Alabama was also ranked in the AP Poll . Tennessee dropped out of the polls before playing Auburn ; however , Vanderbilt would enter the polls by the time the Commodores played Auburn . Game notes . Louisiana - Monroe . Auburn ' s first possession only picked up 1 first down , but the punt put UL - Monroe in bad field position . On the first play , Auburn Defensive End Antonio Coleman made a huge hit on UL - Monroe ' s quarterback , forcing a fumble on the UL - Monroe 9 - yard line , and the Defense picked it up and took it back for the Auburn Tigers ' first touchdown . A few possessions later , Auburn Receiver and Punt Returner Robert Dunn returned a UL - Monroe punt for a TD with 0 : 04 left in the 1st Quarter . At halftime , Auburn had a 17 – 0 lead after a Wes Byrum field goal . On the opening kickoff of the 3rd quarter , UL - Monroe fumbled the ball and Auburn recovered , leading to a TD run from Brad Lester . Another field goal from Byrum would make the score 27 – 0 going into the 4th Quarter . Kodi Burns had left the game with a cut in his leg , so Chris Todd played the rest of the game . Later in the 4th , Todd would lead Auburn down the field with an excellent and suddenly effective passing game , ending in a 3 - yard Touchdown pass to Chris Slaughter to seal the victory . It was the first shutout for Auburn since a 27 – 0 wins over Arkansas State on November 4 , 2006 . It was also the first time Auburn had scored on Offense , Defense , and Special Teams since the 2003 73 – 7 beating of UL - Monroe . Auburn finished with 406 yards of offense , 321 Rushing yards and 85 passing yards . Auburn picked up 19 first downs while UL - Monroe picked up 12 . Southern Miss . Southern Miss returned to the Plains for the first time since the 1993 perfect season . Prior to that meeting , the Tigers had lost consecutive 1 - point losses to Southern Miss , then quarterbacked by Brett Favre . Despite impressive offensive numbers in their opening game where Southern Mississippi put up 633 yards ( 427 rushing ) in a 51 – 21 win over Louisiana - Lafayette , Larry Fedora ' s team did not have an answer for Auburn ' s tough defense . The Tigers won 27 – 13 , improving their lead in the series all - time to 17 – 5 . Depth chart . Starters and backups .