Obviously expectations were through the roof for Auburn defensive end Byron Cowart, the nation’s No. 1 recruiting prospect from the 2015 signing class. With Auburn desperate to come up with pass rushers, the pressure for Cowart to make an immediate impact was intense.

But although he arrived at Auburn with similar credentials, Cowart failed to follow in the footsteps of similar top SEC recruits like Jadeveon Clowney at South Carolina and Robert Nkemdiche at Ole Miss, who became successes relatively quickly at their respective schools.

Contrasting his 185 career tackles and 29 sacks in high school, Cowart recorded just six tackles and six quarterback hurries over 12 games in his first year at Auburn.

Cowart had and still has a lot to learn, both on and off the field. He took out his frustrations during fall camp last August in several tweets, according to the Ledger-Enquiror, that were soon after deleted.

“Being penalized because I was number 1 player but I’m struggling i don’t care about the stars,” Cowart was reported to have tweeted. “So why when I struggle it’s thrown in my face. How about help me huh? I came in humble ready to learn man not bragging and flashy. I just wanna learn.”

Everyone has their learning curve out of high school, Cowart is no exception.

“I’m just trying to take ‘Coach G’s (defensive line coach Rodney Garner) coaching and get better,” he told 247Sports recently. “The competition, with guys coming in, you don’t want to get passed up. I just want to take the coaching and get better. I feel like I’m getting there, but I’m not there yet.

“It was hard in the beginning, but I came in to learn. I didn’t come in trying to boast and brag, I just came in to learn. It was hard, it was an adjustment, but I learned that everybody at this level is good and you have to bring you’re A game every day.”

Will his sophomore season be better than his freshman year? The 6-foot-3, 277-pounder is too good of a talent not to improve. Besides, he has nowhere else to go but up.

“It’s not instantaneous like he thought or the media or all these recruiting services sitting there and saying, ‘You’re going to be the savior’ and this and that,” Garner told AL.com. “It doesn’t always happen like that.”

But he continues to make an impression on both Garner and Kevin Steele, Auburn’s new defensive coordinator.

“He is a physical talent with a great attitude,” Steele told AL.com. “He’s still young and being a physical, dominant player and playing with great effort, he’s bought into that.”

Will he make a bigger impact in his second season with the Tigers? He’s bound to, especially with the departure of DaVonte Lambert, a senior defensive end last year. Cowart has been playing a bigger role in spring practices. He’s taken snaps with both the first and second teams this spring, according to AL.com, though he recently practiced with the third team.

Cowart came on toward the end of last season and the extra work with bowl preparation was beneficiary as well. He should come back in the fall a much more mature and polished player and could become a solid compliment to Carl Lawson on the other side of the Auburn defensive line.

“It’s not going to be easy,” Cowart told 247Sports. “If it was easy, everybody would be in the NFL.”