AUBURN — Auburn football coach Hugh Freeze couldn’t even fully answer the question before getting interrupted.
Asked how recruiting has changed and if he has ever experienced anything like it in his career before, his phone buzzed in his back pocket.
“It’s never felt quite like it feels now,” Freeze said at an AMBUSH event in Huntsville last month. “You obviously have to recruit your players while you’re trying to recruit others and trying to manage − my phone, both phones are ringing right now and I guarantee you it has something to do with recruiting.”
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He was right.
“Yup, this is a good one,” Freeze said.
The call could’ve been about any number of things. Perhaps it was about one of the incoming transfers Auburn added this month.
Or maybe it was about a recruit in the Class of 2024, a cycle in which the Tigers have already landed five commitments, including four-star QB Walker White, who chose Auburn in February over Baylor and Clemson.
The Tigers have added 37 new players since Freeze arrived to the Plains in November: 19 high school recruits, 16 transfers and two from junior college. Of that bunch, nine are offensive linemen.
Auburn added nine offensive linemen in the previous three recruiting cycles combined.
“It’s just different,” Freeze said after putting his phone back in his pocket. “But it’s the same for everybody. I’m kind of getting to the point where you just kind of take it in stride and know, ‘You know what, it is what it is and we’re going to do what is best for Auburn and hopefully get a group of young men that believe in that vision and that culture.’
“It’s going to have to be a mixture of high school kids and portal kids. It’s just the world we’re in now.”
Freeze has been open about his approach to recruiting at Auburn. He hired assistants he’s confident in to run the majority of the football side of things. That way he gets to focus on being a recruiter.
That was seen at various spring practices, as he was often off to the side talking to a recruit and his family while coordinators Philip Montgomery and Ron Roberts, along with the other assistants, ran the show.
“As much as I love calling plays, and I’m certain I still will do that at some (points), but I can’t sit in that room all day and manage that entire roster, plus recruiting,” Freeze said. “It’s definitely different.”
Freeze also pointed to his personnel staff, who sift through information and filter what is brought to his attention.
“I’ve kind of just gotten to where I don’t look too much and I wait for the text from them that says, ‘This one here, you need to look at, coach.’ That helps me a lot,” Freeze said. “But truthfully, I don’t get stressed too much anymore in life. … I think you get to a point that (you say), ‘You know what, I know what we do is good.’
“I know it can win. Now, let me just drive that train and get a group of guys and coaches together. That’s the challenge: Getting the locker room to buy into that. At the end of the day, if it’s not good enough, it’s not good enough. Me stressing over it is not going to add any value whatsoever to Auburn, to my family (or) to my life. So, I really don’t stress too much over that.”
Richard Silva is the Auburn athletics beat writer for the Montgomery Advertiser. He can be reached via email at rsilva@gannett.com or on Twitter @rich_silva18.
This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Why Hugh Freeze focuses on recruiting, not plays, with Auburn football
