Auburn had one final chance to salvage its season. A win over a top-5 team trying to sneak into the College Football Playoff would have easily been the biggest moment of the year. The Tigers squandered the opportunity.

But is a 6-4 record heading into a bowl game good enough? Has at least 4 losses in a season — something Gus Malzahn has now down for 7 straight years — become the status quo?

“It’ll be transition,” Malzahn said following Auburn’s 31-20 loss to Texas A&M. “[The goal will] be the next-best, the 6-4. That’s what it’ll be, 6-4. If you had a normal non-conference schedule, it’d be a solid year.”

Since turning around a 3-9 team into a 12-win SEC Champion national runner-up in 2013, fans have become increasingly frustrated at Auburn’s stagnation as it bitter rivals continue to distance themselves from the Tigers.

To be fair, Auburn was dealt a pretty weak hand this year. On top of COVID-related availability issues and a litany of injuries, the Tigers played 3 teams ranked in the top 5 at the time of the game. They were outscored 100-39. But in a normal year with nonconference games and only 8 conference games, Auburn likely would be looking at another 9-4 season. Not Alabama. But not terrible, either.

Instead Auburn (5-4) finds itself staring at the possibility of a sub-.500 season. Sure, the Tigers will likely beat Mississippi State next week, but they could win by 100 and the calls for Malzahn’s job will never silence. The Bulldogs aren’t close to being ranked, meaning, again, Auburn won’t have a single victory against a team that finished the season ranked.

“Obviously, we’re not happy we weren’t able to beat one of those ranked teams,” Malzahn said. “I think we played the No. 1, No. 5 and what was it, No. 2 or 3 on the road earlier, and we weren’t able to win those games.”

This was expected to be a year in a transition. Auburn was ushering in a new offensive coordinator, and Kevin Steele was tasked with replacing a load of talent lost to the NFL and graduation. But through 9 games, things on the offensive side of the ball still don’t seem to be progressing as they should, and the defense was just blown out of the trenches against the Aggies. Auburn managed to be the highlight of South Carolina’s miserable season, and if not for a blown call against Arkansas, could very well be in the cellar of the SEC West with Mike Leach.

“Learning how to go through adversity is just part of the process,” Bo Nix said on Saturday. “It’s not like we have a bad team by any means. We played 10 SEC opponents, and it wasn’t like we were blessed with the opportunity to play the lowest 4 like some other teams. We battled and we competed the entire season. Teams that maybe we played that were ranked, they just had good football teams and great experience.”

The fact that other programs in the league have shown no trepidation in firing head coaches despite glaring budget shortfalls during a pandemic only intensifies the chatter surrounding Malzahn. If Tennessee were to part ways with Jeremy Pruitt, could that be last nudge Auburn administrators need to make a similar move?

Over 8 seasons Malzahn has won 67 games and played in 3 New Year’s 6 bowls. That’s the definition of success by most programs’ metrics, but it’s also a sub 66% winning percentage that can become stale over the better course of a decade in the wake of winning the 2010 national championship while watching Alabama win 4 more since then.

Auburn’s 4th-quarter collapse to Texas A&M is just the latest issue conspiring against Malzahn. Despite the disappointment outside of the team though, the head coach may have the most important thing going for him in the faith of his players.

“It’s definitely a learning year,” Nix said. “All you can do is just move forward, make sure you finish the season how you’d like and not just let the whole season go to waste.”

There is likely no one in college football more experienced with handling criticism than Malzahn, but a season void of any signature moments is dangerous territory. As long as Auburn aspires to be in the upper echelon of teams, 4 losses can no longer be the norm.