2/10/23 Auburn Articles

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Reunited with Marcus Davis, Nick Mardner 'wanted a challenge' at Auburn

Nathan King

3–4 minutes

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Auburn clearly needed at least one transfer receiver after the first portal window opened.

Marcus Davis knew exactly who to call.

Arguably the best player Auburn’s new receivers coach has had in his two seasons as an assistant coach, Nick Mardner had been in the portal for 20 days before Davis was hired at Auburn. A couple weeks later, Davis got his former wideout on campus. A commitment only took a couple more days.

“The conversation was that he wanted a challenge for himself,” Davis said last week. “It was a conversation — this place means a lot to me, so it had to be the right fit and the right person. I think he checked all those boxes, and that's what was more of the conversation than anything.”

When Davis took over at Hawaii in 2021 — his first full-time assistant job after off-field positions at Auburn and Florida State — he inherited an athletic wideout with an impressive frame. Mardner had been used sparingly the previous season, but Davis saw his potential as a lead receiver in the Warriors’ offense.

Their marriage resulted in Mardner posting 913 yards, just under 20 yards per catch and five touchdowns through the air. He had three 100-yard performances on the year. Davis also coached a prolific one-two punch in the passing game, with Calvin Turner totaling 876 yards and four touchdowns.

Mardner transferred to Cincinnati last year and was the Bearcats’ No. 3 receiver, finishing with 218 yards and three scores.

“I'm looking forward to it,” Davis said. “The biggest thing I would say is he's a guy who brings a combination of size and speed. He's every bit of 6-5, and he can run. That's something he definitely can bring to the room.”

If Auburn ends up listing Mardner at 6-foot-5, like Davis said, on its spring roster, he’ll be the team’s tallest receiver since Anthony Mix (6-foot-5 and 248 pounds) in 2005.

Originally from Ontario, Canada, Mardner graduated from Cincinnati, and to reunite with his former coach for his final season of eligibility just made too much sense.

"He’s like family," Mardner said after his visit to Auburn. "We were tied back to Hawaii in ‘21 and he was a big part of my development. I think I played my best ball with him.”

Auburn plucked Davis, who played receiver for the Tigers from 2013-16, after one season coaching the position at Georgia Southern. He helped the Eagles post a top-5 passing game in college football, and his receiving corps had three players go for at least 700 yards.

Auburn’s receivers have been one of the program’s more inconsistent positions over the past couple seasons, though the group returns every player from its primary rotation last year.

“We've got other guys in the room that can do some things, as well, that probably didn't have the opportunity,” Davis said. “The biggest thing for me is getting everybody together, getting them on the same page — because competition is going to bring the best out in everybody.”

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Now at Auburn, Josh Aldridge copied Ron Roberts' defense while at Liberty

Published: Feb. 09, 2023, 7:05 a.m.

6–7 minutes

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Before Josh Aldridge and Ron Roberts became colleagues on Hugh Freeze’s staff at Auburn, Aldridge already had a pretty good feel for Roberts’ defensive scheme.

After three years as Liberty’s defensive line coach under Freeze, Aldridge was promoted to the Flames’ defensive coordinator last season while also serving as linebackers coach. As he put together his vision for how he wanted Liberty’s defense to look under his watch, Aldridge drew inspiration from what Roberts was doing defensively at Baylor.

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“We played a really tough schedule last year at Liberty, and I knew we needed to be aggressive and switched a few things, and the defense I studied was Baylor, actually,” Aldridge said last week. “I actually copy and pasted Baylor’s defense basically.”

Why Aldridge was drawn to Roberts’ system is understandable.

Roberts is one of the most well-respected defensive minds in the sport, and his coaching tree has helped produce the likes of Baylor head coach Dave Aranda, Ole Miss (and former Alabama) defensive coordinator Pete Golding, Cincinnati defensive coordinator Bryan Brown and Florida defensive coordinator Patrick Toney, among others. That’s to say nothing of the success he had at Baylor in 2021, the season immediately preceding Aldridge’s promotion at Liberty.

Roberts helped Baylor produce a top-10 scoring defense that season, limiting opponents to 18.3 points per game in a conference — the Big 12 — that’s known for its prolific offenses. The Bears were also 28th nationally that season in yards allowed per play (5.15), and they produced one of the highest havoc rates in the nation (27 percent) while ranking fifth in sacks (44), seventh in tackles for loss (104), third in interceptions (19), 28th in pass breakups (48) and seventh in turnovers forced (27).

“When you turn his defense on, I don’t think you can say, ‘They’re a this; they’re a that,’” Aldridge said. “He’s got a lot of answers on how to attack people week-to-week based on the offense you face, which is great in this league because in this league you’re going to face teams that throw it 60 times, all the way to the Alabamas and Georgias, that’ll have three tight ends on the field. I think that’s what makes a great coordinator on defense. You’ve got to have a big enough toolbox to have answers.”

In attempting to emulate Roberts’ system at Liberty, Aldridge added support staffers and off-field assistants who already had familiarity with that scheme. The results at Liberty, albeit against a lighter schedule than the one he’ll be seeing at Auburn, were promising.

While the Flames were 53rd nationally in scoring defense last season (24.6 points per game), they were a top-20 unit in terms of yards allowed per play (4.96) while leading the nation in tackles for loss (121), finishing third in sacks (45) and ranking top-15 in takeaways (24).

When Freeze accepted the Auburn job in late November, Aldridge took over as Liberty’s interim head coach for the team’s bowl game. As Freeze worked to put together his inaugural staff on the Plains, Aldridge had a pretty good indication of who he was going to target as defensive coordinator — Roberts, who was on the market after being let go at Baylor, where the Bears took a step back defensively in 2022.

That’s why, when Freeze approached Aldridge about serving as a position coach for the Tigers, he jumped at the opportunity — even if it meant no longer calling plays on defense.

“That really sealed the deal for me about me wanting to come here and learn from him,” Aldridge said. “He’s one of the best minds in college football, and it’s going to be really neat for me to be with him this year.”

Now Aldridge will have a chance to see how Roberts operates firsthand. Roberts will serve as Auburn’s defensive coordinator in 2023, while Aldridge is the Tigers’ linebackers coach.

Following a rigorous push on the recruiting front over the last two months, Roberts and Aldridge—as well as the rest of the defensive staff—finally had their first meetings last week when it comes to X’s and O’s and what Auburn wants to accomplish as spring rapidly approaches. While they’re still in “the beginning stages” of figuring all that out, Roberts and Aldridge have discussed what they look for at each linebacker position as they prepare to do a full assessment of Auburn’s returning personnel and newcomers.

“We can go into it and say, ‘In the past, this type of style of a player has done well at MIKE; this one’s done well at WILL,’” Aldridge said. “But this staff on defense, especially, we’re not going into the spring saying ‘This is who we are and this that and the other.’ We’re really more so getting out there and seeing what our guys are good at and having enough confidence in ourselves as coaches to run the scheme that’ll put them in a position to make plays.

“We don’t ever want to handcuff our guys into being in a system that they don’t fit in, right? Especially in today’s climate, where your roster might flip a little bit, or being a new staff, you need to be a good enough coach to tailor your defense to what they’re good at and not vice versa.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.

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Why Cadillac Williams was 'ecstatic' Auburn landed USF transfer RB Brian Battie

Published: Feb. 09, 2023, 11:51 a.m.

6–7 minutes

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Brian Battie wasn’t on Cadillac Williams’ radar until Philip Montgomery planted a seed during an early film session among Auburn’s new offensive assistants.

Before Battie, the former South Florida running back, hit the portal, Montgomery and Williams were studying film when the former Tulsa head coach recalled one of the best individual performances against his team last season. In Tulsa’s 48-42 win against USF on Nov. 18, Battie rushed for 169 yards while averaging 8.89 yards per carry. It was the highest individual rushing performance surrendered by Tulsa’s defense last season.

“Cadillac, South Florida’s got a running back that’s tough,” Williams recalled Montgomery saying.

Read more Auburn football: Now colleagues at Auburn, Josh Aldridge “copy and pasted” Ron Roberts’ Baylor defense while at Liberty last season

“That was wild”: How Auburn climbed the 2023 recruiting rankings after late-season coaching change

Zac Etheridge, Wesley McGriff excited about Auburn secondary that returns every key piece in 2023

Williams took note and filed it away in the back of his mind. Auburn’s running back room was in need of another option; it was returning Jarquez Hunter and a less-experienced piece in Damari Alston while bringing in four-star 2023 signee Jeremiah Cobb, but the Tigers wanted more depth after leading rusher Tank Bigsby declared for the NFL Draft.

The only problem? At the time, Battie wasn’t in the transfer portal.

That changed on Jan. 6, when Battie opted to transfer from USF after three productive seasons, including a consensus All-America nod as a return specialist in 2021 and a 1,000-yard campaign in 2022. Williams perked up as soon as he saw Battie’s name in the portal, recalling Montgomery’s earlier mention of the 5-foot-8, 165-pounder.

“To have a guy like him jump in there, I was ecstatic,” Williams said. “So, (I) got an opportunity to cut on his film, and his film speaks for itself.”

It’s not every day a program has an opportunity to bring in a former All-American through the transfer market, and Williams was thoroughly impressed with what he saw from Battie during his time at South Florida in the various roles he played. There was of course the 1,186 rushing yards last fall, when Battie averaged 6.7 yards per carry—the 20th-best mark among FBS running backs in 2022. His 98.83 rushing yards per game ranked 23rd among all qualifying players in the country. He had seven 100-yard performances as a junior, including five in a row to close out the year, and has nine for his career.

Then there was Battie’s prowess in the return game, where he established himself as one of the nation’s most dangerous special teams weapons the last two seasons. Battie was a consensus All-American in 2021 while averaging 32.5 yards per kickoff return (sixth-best in the nation) and returning an FBS-leading three of them for touchdowns. He followed it up by averaging 20 yards per return last season while juggling those responsibilities with a featured role in the Bulls’ backfield. For his career, he averaged 24.2 yards per kick return.

“Whenever you turn on (film) — first of all, the speed, the explosiveness, but I love the fact that the first guy, he either made him miss or broke the tackle,” Williams said. “The first guy is never going to bring him down or tackle him. He always—also, he’s a smaller guy, but he’s a natural runner between the tackles. He’s a running back. He’s a football player. He’s a guy that understands leverage and angles, a guy that’s going to break tackles, and he’s strong, and he’s very competitive, and he wants to be one of the best. We are getting a complete back that I think can do it all.”

What really stood out to Williams about Battie’s film, though, was how he performed when given the opportunity to face SEC competition. South Florida traveled to Florida last September to take on the Gators in The Swamp, and Battie turned in one of the best games of his career. He rushed for 150 yards — at the time a career high, and by the end of the year the second-best mark of his career — and a touchdown while averaging 8.82 yards per carry. On the road. Against an SEC defense.

“If you turn on the Florida game and you watch him run the football, and again, I’m going to keep saying, he’s not a scatback… he’s a guy that you can run between the tackles,” Williams said. “He’s a guy that understands leverage and angles. He’s a guy that’s going to break tackles, as small as he is. He’s a guy that’s going to break tackles. He’s got superior vision, will stick his foot in the ground, you know, explosive guy. Man, he’s a guy that’s dynamic, man, that I know Coach Freeze and Coach Montgomery are waiting to see everything he can do and how we can utilize his talent.”

But first, Auburn had to acquire that talent. As soon as Battie hit the portal, Williams—whose NFL career was largely spent in Tampa, Fla.—used his local connections to find out more about Battie. Combined with the efforts of defensive intern Ty Holder, Auburn was able to get in touch with Battie and quickly arrange a visit to campus just two days after his name appeared in the transfer portal.

A day later, Battie committed to Auburn, providing the backfield with a veteran piece to pair alongside Hunter and a potential impact player on special teams.

“He gets to come here and have an opportunity to define his role and play big-boy ball,” Williams said. “…I’m excited about Brian. I thank God for us having the opportunity to get him and him choosing Auburn.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.

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How Auburn made 'wild' climb up 2023 recruiting rankings after coaching change

Updated: Feb. 08, 2023, 8:42 a.m.|Published: Feb. 08, 2023, 7:05 a.m.

11–14 minutes

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The on-field product wasn’t the only thing that fell apart during Bryan Harsin’s disastrous tenure at Auburn. The Tigers’ recruiting efforts were well behind those of their peers and biggest rivals.

At the time of Harsin’s firing on Halloween, Auburn’s 2023 recruiting class was ranked 55th in the nation and 13th out of 14 SEC programs, according to the 247Sports Composite team rankings. It was a precipitous fall for Auburn on the recruiting trail under Harsin, and a steep climb for the program after his departure.

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Yet in the three months since Harsin’s firing, Auburn’s coaching staff — first the interim staff under Cadillac Williams and then the new staff under Hugh Freeze — worked tirelessly to make up ground with the 2023 class and through the transfer portal. When the dust settled on National Signing Day last week, Auburn finished with the nation’s No. 17 signing class and a transfer haul that ranked fourth in the country.

“There’s no more important thing (than recruiting),” Freeze said. “I would love to say that I knew our team better, but the current roster demanded that we hit it hard. I just wasn’t afforded the opportunity to sit in the office and do anything else other than recruit. So, we hit it hard…. It’s hard to really say how much we closed the gap on the teams that you’re trying to catch, but I do believe that we improved ourselves.”

That improvement took a concerted effort from Auburn’s staff over those three months — from on-field coaches to personnel staff and the Tigers’ recruiting office, it was an all-hands-on-deck endeavor to salvage the 2023 class and restock the cupboard heading into Freeze’s first season as head coach.

That effort began in earnest as soon as Harsin was out the door and Auburn’s staff experienced an in-season shakeup. Williams was elevated to interim head coach, and with a shorthanded and restructured staff, the Tigers worked to make the most of the final month of the regular season. It was a four-week stretch that included two games at Jordan-Hare Stadium, the first of which was an instantly memorable gameday atmosphere against Texas A&M.

During that final month of the regular season, Williams and Co. worked to hold the class together while also getting a couple of key additions. Auburn picked up commitments from four-star defensive lineman Darron Reed and three-star edge defender Brenton Williams. Reed, a top-200 recruit in the 2023 class, flipped from LSU the week of the Iron Bowl. Williams, a local prospect from Opelika, committed just hours before Freeze was hired as Auburn’s next coach on Nov. 28.

“Honestly, Auburn is a special, special place, and I think those four weeks of getting kids here on campus, letting them see that gameday atmosphere and us getting that push on the national level — even though we were a 5-7 team — (helped),” Williams said.

After Freeze took over as head coach, he made recruiting his top priority, even as he worked to quickly assemble his inaugural staff on the Plains. Time was of the essence, with just more than three weeks between Freeze’s hiring and the start of the early signing period on Dec. 21.

“It’s been some sleepless nights,” said defensive backs coach Zac Etheridge, one of the only holdovers from the previous staff. “I mean, we’ve been on the road, we’ve been in a lot of schools, we’ve been all over, and we just been getting out…. This is what you signed up to do. This is what you love. You get a chance to meet new people. You get a chance to talk about Auburn, what you truly love. So, it’s not been a job. It’s been fun and we’re excited about the results.”

Those results started to show in the days leading up to the early signing period. On Dec. 11, Auburn flipped four-star cornerback Colton Hood from Michigan State and three-star offensive tackle Tyler Johnson from Texas Tech following their official visits to the Plains. Two days later, the staff flipped four-star center Connor Lew from Miami.

The Sunday before the December signing period, Auburn picked up commitments from four-star safety Sylvester Smith and three-star defensive lineman Stephen Johnson, who flipped from Arkansas, as well as FIU tight end transfer Rivaldo Fairweather. Then on the eve of signing day, the Tigers added commitments from three-star quarterback Hank Brown, who was previously committed to Freeze at Liberty; three-star JUCO defensive lineman Quientrail Jamison-Travis; three-star JUCO offensive tackle Izavion Miller and Vanderbilt edge transfer Elijah McAllister.

Another wave came at the start of the early signing period. Auburn landed its two highest-rated recruits in the 2023 class, flipping four-star defensive lineman Keldric Faulk from Florida State and four-star cornerback Kayin Lee from Ohio State.

By the end of the day, Auburn was up to No. 19 in the 247Sports Composite team rankings, and that was before All-America cornerback Tyler Scott announced his commitment on Jan. 7 (though he signed with Auburn prior to going public with his decision) and three-star corner C.J. Johnson a day later.

It required quite the sprint to the finish line to make the move 36 spots up in the rankings after Harsin’s firing. While that surge overlapped with the beginning of the first transfer window, the flurry of activity paled in comparison to the frenzied push from Freeze and his staff during that 45-day transfer window.

RELATED: Breaking down Auburn’s additions, losses and remaining needs after first transfer portal window

While Freeze said at his introductory press conference that he wanted high school recruiting to be the foundation of what he builds at Auburn, he acknowledged the need to lean heavily into the transfer portal in Year 1.

Auburn’s staff treated that 45-day window with a sense of urgency, adding a dozen transfers and retaining a couple of players — defensive lineman Zykeivous Walker and wide receiver Tar’Varish Dawson Jr. — who previously opted to transfer during Harsin’s tenure.

“I kind of feel like you’re at an auction that’s going three times faster than it’s supposed to,” defensive coordinator Ron Roberts said. “…You just kind of had to dive in with two feet and keep rolling, remain flexible day to day.”

Auburn’s staff closely monitored the transfer portal and moved quickly when possible fits became available. The biggest area the Tigers wanted to address was the line of scrimmage, so they prioritized the offensive and defensive lines.

Offensively, it was a push for a rapid rebuild and replenishing of the numbers in the trenches. Although Auburn already signed five offensive linemen — four high school recruits and a JUCO prospect — the work wasn’t done in trying to hit Freeze’s desired number of 16 linemen on scholarship.

“With the transfer portal and how competitive it is, it’s certainly a challenge, but a challenge that I was excited about,” offensive line coach Jake Thornton said. “This is not my first O-line having to rebuild. You know, this is the biggest one I’ve had to rebuild, but at Tennessee Tech and Gardner Webb, those two places were in similar situations where I had to go rebuild.”

First, Auburn added four-star offensive tackle transfer Dillon Wade, who played for new Tigers offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery when he was head coach at Tulsa. A couple weeks later, the program added another bookend piece to the line with four-star Western Kentucky offensive tackle transfer Gunner Britton. The final addition to the offensive line came Jan. 10, when four-star ECU transfer Avery Jones flipped from Illinois, providing Auburn with an experienced potential starter at center.

“Some of those challenges were very daunting, truthfully,” Freeze said. “I don’t remember a time in my whole career where we felt like we had to sign nine offensive linemen. I mean, that’s unheard of to try to get to your 16 number. That’s a big challenge…. There was just no way around it. We had to get after it.”

On the other side of the line of scrimmage, Auburn needed reinforcements after losing Derick Hall, Eku Leota and Colby Wooden, among others along the defensive line. The Tigers were set to return just seven defensive linemen from last season, with only a few key contributors returning to the fold. While Auburn signed five in the 2023 class, experience and — perhaps more importantly — immediate depth were needed up front for the Tigers to be able to accomplish what they felt necessary in spring practice and throughout the offseason.

Auburn found that in a foursome of Power 5 transfers: the aforementioned McAllister, former Kentucky defensive tackle Justin Rogers, former Maryland defensive lineman Mosiah Nasili-Kite and former Purdue defensive lineman Lawrence Johnson.

“As we looked at adding veteran pieces to that, we wanted guys with experience that weren’t afraid of work,” defensive line coach Jeremy Garrett said. “We signed one-year guys, so guys that aren’t afraid of competing and were saying, ‘let’s compete to be in the rotation.’ I think that was critical for us to add.”

Auburn addressed other needs at linebacker, adding a pair of SEC transfers in DeMario Tolan (LSU) and Austin Keys (Ole Miss), as well as at the offensive skill positions. The Tigers added Cincinnati wide receiver transfer Nick Mardner (who previously played for position coach Marcus Davis at Hawaii in 2021), South Florida running back transfer Brian Battie (a consensus All-America return specialist in 2021) and Fairweather, the former FIU tight end.

According to Roberts, there were days when Auburn wasn’t sure it was going to get any big wins in the transfer portal. By the time the window closed, the Tigers got 12 of them, even if there were some misses along the way.

RELATED: Auburn coaches want to assess trio of returning QBs, adapt offense to their strengths during spring

“That was wild,” Williams said of the transfer window. “I mean, each and every day — it’s a transfer guy in here, it’s just coming like hotcakes. It was something that, at times, was very, very tiring, but it was part of the job, and we know that to flip this roster like that, it’s what we were going to have to do and within the guidelines of where we had an opportunity to really get some guys in here to get us headed in the right direction.

“It was a crazy time, but man, I thought as coaches — for us not really knowing each other, and working together, I thought it was an absolutely awesome job that the staff and Coach Freeze have done in a short period of time.”

There are still some roster needs for Auburn to address during the May transfer window, with Freeze potentially still looking to add a quarterback from the portal, as well as a need for more depth off the edge. While Auburn will surely regret not capitalizing more on a historically deep class of in-state talent in 2023, it’s difficult to not acknowledge just how much ground Auburn has been able to make up on the recruiting front since the end of Harsin’s tenure.

“I’m not really surprised because I saw the first day Coach Freeze got the job, he hit the ground recruiting,” Etheridge said. “…I’m not surprised by any means about what we’ve been able to do and really excited about what the future holds in terms of once we get a full calendar year to go recruit as his staff, things are going to be really exciting to see.”

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group.