Gus Malzahn isn't concerning himself with "rat poison."

[jbcarol]

No rat poison: Gus Malzahn says of handling positive press coverage, "I'll let (the team) know when we've arrived"

Just three days after Alabama coach Nick Saban made headlines by referring to an abundance of positive press coverage as "rat poison" for his team, which beat Texas A&M by a narrow margin of 27-19 after drubbing its previous two SEC opponents by a combined score of 125-3, Auburn's head coach was asked about how he handles such coverage within his own program.

Truth be told, Malzahn doesn't put much stock into any media coverage -- positive or negative -- throughout the season.

"Whether it's four weeks ago or whether it's today, our team, we stay pretty insulated," Malzahn said. "We don't worry about anybody's expectations or what they think outside. It's just about us getting better."

To that end, Auburn has improved since its early-season loss on the road against No. 2 Clemson.

Since that game, Auburn has rattled off four straight wins -- including three straight blowouts to open SEC play --

"We're playing better," Malzahn said. "I told our team we've not arrived. I'll let them know when we've arrived. But we're in the process of having a chance to become a good team."

Malzahn stressed that "you can't read anything into... other people's opinions," while adding that he addresses that with the team, particularly from a social media standpoint, where anyone can fire off a 140-character take about anything. College football teams, of course, are no exception.

"Other people's opinion doesn't really matter anything at all with the team," Malzahn said. "It's just something as a coach in this day in time, you have to address. I wish it wasn't that way but that's a challenge. I think that's a challenge for every head coach. It's one of the bigger challenges because kids are different these days. They're social media and the power of when you read something, what that really means, so I think that's a challenge for every head coach, good or bad. It's never too good or never too bad. You just got to keep it within your room."