Meet AL.com’s new Auburn sports beat writer Peter Rauterkus

On my first day of kindergarten after moving to Alabama, I hadn’t even put my backpack down before a classmate asked me, “Who do you go for?”

I looked back at him confused before he followed up saying, “You know, Alabama or Auburn?” At five years old, I only knew Alabama as the state my family had just moved to and had no idea what Auburn was.

Seventeen years later, I’m back in my home state and thrilled to be an Auburn beat writer for AL.com. And yes, I know a little more about Auburn now than I did then.

Growing up in the state, I quickly fell in love with college sports as many kids my age did.

Not a fall Saturday would go by where I wasn’t camped in front of the TV at 8 a.m. sharp to watch College Gameday, and if I wasn’t watching a game on a Saturday afternoon I was playing football with the other kids in the neighborhood or playing the latest NCAA football video game.

I spent 13 years growing up in the suburbs of Birmingham around a mix of Auburn and Alabama fans, but my most cherished sports memory of that time came on a brisk November night on the plains when a friend invited me to join his family to attend the 2013 Iron Bowl.

I didn’t have a ticket to the game, but sitting alongside thousands of screaming Auburn fans inside Neville Arena showed me how much it means down here.

The scene after Chris Davis returned Adam Griffith’s missed kick for a touchdown is something I’ll never forget. Walking out of the arena and seeing people dancing, hugging and celebrating in the streets was a scene only sports can create.

I knew then that I was meant to be around sports.

However, I realized midway through high school that there weren’t too many 5-foot-8, 150-pound players in the NFL or NBA, meaning I needed to find a new way to channel this passion.

For me, it was writing.

I left Birmingham after high school to attend LSU, (don’t hold it against me) returning to the city of my birth. It was there that I learned just how much I really loved sports journalism.

In the three and a half years I spent working for The Reveille, LSU’s student-run newspaper, I helped cover everything from a Heisman Trophy winner to a women’s basketball national championship.

Add that to an NBA Draft party, an El Clásico and covering Lionel Messi’s first road game as an MLS player. Living through those unforgettable nights showed me just how much this profession has to offer.

But it wasn’t just the big events that made me fall in love with journalism.

It was telling the stories, like that of Collis Temple Jr., the first Black basketball player in LSU history who I profiled as a sophomore. It was finding Jayden Daniels’ Heisman suit designer on Instagram and learning what goes into the often extravagant outfits we see at the Heisman ceremony.

Those stories, on top of the big games, helped me realize that this was my calling, and there’s no better place to find and tell these stories than in SEC country.

All of that now leads me back to the state where I grew up, covering an athletic program and community I got to know through many of my childhood friends.

I’m looking forward to the storytelling, fall Saturdays and more than anything else, the community.

Let’s make some more memories.