ESD 2020: Auburn coaches battle coaching change to keep commitments
Auburn is working through a coaching change to pull in recruits in the early period. (Auburn Media Relations/Todd Van Emst)
By TIM GAYLE
It didn’t take long for Auburn interim head coach Kevin Steele to go over the Tigers’ list of signees on Wednesday but it could have been a lot worse.
Auburn signed just 12 players – a class that is currently ranked 13th in the 14-team Southeastern Conference – but Steele said on Wednesday that only one player, an offensive lineman, had backed out on his commitment and signed with another team in the wake of Gus Malzahn’s firing on Sunday.
“Auburn is a family place, it’s built on family, and the challenges of recruiting without being able to bring prospects to the Auburn campus so they can feel Auburn (was detrimental in recruiting),” Steele said. “Because Auburn is very much about the feel once you get here. This year, the staff had to recruit virtually, we could not bring them to the campus and that is a challenge because Auburn sells itself when you get them on campus.”
The Tigers’ biggest recruit, offensive lineman Jaeden Roberts, did not sign on Wednesday, saying he was opening up his recruiting and will wait until February. Armoni Goodwin, the Tigers’ prized tailback commitment, signed with LSU on Wednesday. Two others, Georgia Tech commit Ian Mathews and Louisiana Tech commit Armani Diamond, were surprise signees with the Tigers on Wednesday.
Steele praised the coaching staff, most of which will be fired when a new head coach is hired, yet were “relentless in their pursuit of trying to keep the class together and represent Auburn in terms of the way that people at Auburn would be proud. Because when you’re trying to sign a class without a head coach, it’s certainly a challenge.”
Steele pointed out that trying to recruit a quarterback between now and February is virtually impossible, so he was thankful North Shore High quarterback Dematrius Davis of Houston, Texas, followed up on his commitment by signing with Auburn on Wednesday. Davis is considered one of the top dual-threat quarterbacks in the nation.
The signing class includes three secondary players with the addition of Diamond along with a wide receiver, two tight ends, an offensive lineman and four defensive linemen. A fifth defensive lineman is expected to sign on Friday. While there are 11 vacancies that can be filled in February by the new coaching staff, Steele noted that “an option for the next leader” would be to take some of the defensive linemen and move them to fill much-needed vacancies on the offensive line.
“We have a lot of linemen, particularly defensive linemen, on the team,” he said. “There’s been programs in the past – I’ve been part of programs in the past – where there have been successful moves from defense to offense.”
Among those four defensive linemen that signed on Wednesday was the biggest recruit in Auburn’s early signing class, Blount High defensive tackle Lee Hunter (6-foot-5, 300 pounds).
In addition to the 12 that signed on Wednesday, five others “are holding (to) wait to see who the head coach is,” Steele said.
While rankings won’t be finalized until February, Rivals ranked Auburn 52nd nationally on Wednesday behind every Southeastern Conference school except South Carolina, which also went through a coaching change this fall.
Steele is considered by some as an option for Malzahn’s replacement, but media were not allowed to ask the Tigers’ defensive coordinator about the job opening on Wednesday. Steele, however, took the time to praise Malzahn for his service to the university, but saved his highest praise for the dozen signees who inked with the Tigers on Wednesday.
“These 12 showed a commitment to Auburn University that is the kind of commitment you would want in the fourth quarter of the Iron Bowl,” Steele said. “They did not waiver and they were committed to finish for Auburn.”