Jimbo Fisher

Florida State head coach Jimbo Fisher directs his team against Duke in the first half of the Atlantic Coast Conference Championship Game in Charlotte, N.C., Saturday, Dec. 7, 2013. (AP Photo/Bob Leverone)

ANAHEIM, California -- It's been eight, maybe 10 years since Jimbo Fisher stepped into the woods outside Auburn.

The Florida State coach still holds Auburn close to his heart, but as his career moved forward and he became a head coach, the former 27-year-old assistant coach at Auburn had little time to spare to don camouflage and hunt deer or turkeys.

"Naive, green," Fisher said, reflecting recently on his first major Division I job as Auburn's quarterbacks coach in 1993.

Fisher has come a long way, sure, since he served six years as an assistant coach under Terry Bowden at Auburn. The 48-year-old Fisher will lead Florida State into the BCS Championship Game against No. 2 Auburn (12-1) on Monday.

He has a new contract in hand, too, which is expected to be worth close to $4 million a year. His name has been tied to the vacancy at Texas, which is considered one of the top college football jobs in the country.

It's hard to believe that, at one time, the coach got his start inside the state of Alabama. He served as graduate assistant and then offensive coordinator under Bowden at Samford before they moved up to Auburn in 1993 and led the Tigers to an unexpected 11-0 season.

He earned $15,000 a year as an offensive coordinator at Samford, where he helped lead the Bulldogs to the Division I-AA semifinals.

"I couldn't even pay rent," Fisher said. "(My wife) Candi thinks that's why I had to start dating her. She had a job. I was a poor football coach."

Fisher laughs as he remembers those days. He easily rattles off his favorite play calls and player names as if he was still at Samford or Auburn today.

"You know what's funny?" Fisher said. "I was as happy as I ever was."

In a sport moving more and more into the business realm, where coaches tighten up as their paychecks grow larger, Fisher remembers the days when it was all so fresh and so fun. The thrill of the chase -- championships, better jobs and winning -- motivates any young coach. It also weeds out the weak links.

"I believe this: You coach because you love doing it, and I always tell folks that want to get in coaching, go live without it and see if you can," Fisher said. "If you can't, come back and coach because it's too much of a lifestyle, it's too much of a commitment to you, your family and to these guys. Because I'm going to tell you something, if you're not working at it 16, 18 hours a day, you're cheating these guys because they're putting their futures in your hands. It's too competitive, it's too hard and you truly have to love the game, to me, to be one of the guys that makes it successful, and that's what I always love, I always loved the game and never envisioned myself out of it."

His favorite moments at Auburn?

James Bostic's 70-yard touchdown run, which pulled the Tigers ahead of Alabama in the 1993 Iron Bowl certainly stands out. So does the game-winning field goal against Florida the same season as the Tigers started their 22-game winning streak under Bowden.

Fisher got his start under a Bowden, then followed the legendary coach Bobby Bowden at Florida State. The path has proven to be a good one for Fisher, who went from LSU to FSU as an assistant coach and now to a national championship game as a head coach.

"As I look back at it now, I didn't even know I didn't know," Fisher said of his first years coaching college football. "I was just going about it, just full force, kind of like I was a freshman like these guys."

Reality can set in on a coach from time to time, too. Life is great when you're winning, but it can turn quickly when a coach starts to lose. Fisher's first eye-opening moment arrived in 1998, when Bowden resigned after a 1-4 season at Auburn. Fisher had to move up and become the offensive coordinator for the remainder of the season.

"No matter what you say about all this stuff, it's business because they can love you and love you, and all of a sudden they don't love you, you're gone," Fisher said. "It doesn't matter. It is a business. They pat you on the back and they can pat you one day, and kick you on the tail the next."