One week and one meet into the 2013 track and field season, the Tigers seem to have hit the ground running, jumping and throwing as they attempt to follow up a brilliant 2012 campaign.
The Tigers opened the season Saturday, Jan. 12 with a win at the Crimson Tide Indoor Opener in Birmingham.
Spry was quick to acknowledge the team's flaws in its season opening victory--namely some lack of effort on the part of unnamed players--but said he won't know how the team is clicking until the third or fourth week.
Due to the brevity of the indoor season--approximately two months long--and the perennially difficult SEC schedule, Spry said that, along with good health, the team's mindset is crucial to its success this season.
"It's always going to be a grind, because there's so much quality," Spry said. "A lot of times you can be fourth in the SEC and fourth in nationals. That's how quality it is."
In a sport where sprinting is the marquee event, even fifth-year senior sprinter and 2012 U.S. Olympic trials finalist Marcus Rowland conceded that no matter how quick the start, the season is a marathon.
"It's still early in the year, and we've got a lot of attention, but I think that as long as we stay healthy we'll be fine," Rowland said. "You know we've got the speed, all it takes is just one cold day, one cold practice to mess up a whole six or five months so we've just been trying to listen to our body and take it slow."
The Tigers are not strangers to the adverse effects injuries can inflict on a team.
Last season, Auburn's women finished 24th and the men finished sixth at the NCAA Outdoor Championship, the men's team's best finish at the meet since finishing second in 2008.
The men may have cracked the top 5 or even snatched the title, however star sprinter Harry Adams suffered a knee injury and was withheld from two key events on the final day.
This year, the men's team was ranked No. 11 in the national preseason rankings largely due to the return of Rowland and a healthy Adams who was named to the Bowerman Award Watch List for the nation's most outstanding track and field athlete.
Of the 10 athletes named to the list, Adams is the only sprinter and is one of only two SEC athletes in the running.
"It's the Heisman Trophy of track and field," Spry said of Adams' nomination. "To even be mentioned in the Bowerman Award clearly says that you're one of the best hands down. Not just in the sprints, but in all events."
Spry's team may seem to have what it takes to win a national title, but first the team must continue to stay healthy.
"The group I've got this year, I feel very confident, particularly on the men's side, that we can be a real force, but again we have to take care of things like staying healthy," Spry said. "If we can take care of those things, then we're going to give ourselves a really good opportunity to have a really good team at the national level."
Where the men's team has experience, the women have youth and raw potential.
Auburn's women's team was ranked No. 24 in the preseason rankings, and senior high jumper and two-time SEC Champion Maya Pressley said her team is "kind of the underdog" heading into 2013 after losing numerous seniors.
Like Rowland and Adams, Pressley is looking to make the most of her final season and fulfill her own potential.
Pressley ended the 2012 season by being eliminated after her attempt to clear 1.83 meters clipped the bar and knocked it from the rack at nationals.
In the season opener, Pressley cleared 1.8 meters, a career best opening score.
Of course for Pressley, Rowland and the rest of the team, the season has only just begun.
Auburn will compete at home this weekend as they compete in the Auburn Indoor Invitational Saturday, Jan. 19.
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