UPDATED: Auburn football racking up commitments

By Collin Mickle

Published: June 17, 2008

Updated 9 p.m. with Auburn’s 16th verbal commitment

Auburn’s summer football camps are a key recruiting tool for the Tigers’ coaches.

Head coach Tommy Tuberville and his assistants use the camps as an opportunity to bring prospects to Auburn’s campus, where they can show off their football skills live and in person. The camps are an important part of AU’s recruiting; many prospects don’t receive scholarship offers from Auburn until after attending a camp.

Obviously, AU’s coaches liked what they saw last weekend.

The Tigers piled up five commitments in three days after the conclusion of this weekend’s camp, which brought in 18 high schools from across the Southeast.

Wide receivers Travante Stallworth and LaVoyd James, athlete LaDarius Perkins and offensive linemen Andre Harris and Aaron Moore all attended the camp, which ended Sunday.

Stallworth, Perkins and Harris officially committed to AU on Sunday. James, from Williamson, announced his commitment the next day. Moore, from Frisco, Texas, waited all the way to Tuesday before announcing his own commitment.

The surge of commitments brings Auburn’s current haul to 16, by far the Tigers’ highest mid-June total in memory.

Harris is the highest-profile of the five recent commitments. The 6-foot-4, 327-pounder from Hampton, Ga., is rated a three-star prospect by Rivals.com. He chose AU over scholarship offers from Tennessee, Georgia Tech, Mississippi State, N.C. State, Rutgers and Virginia, among others.

Harris plays at Hampton’s Lovejoy High School, the alma mater of current AU players Mario Fannin and Byron Isom. Harris told Auburnsports.com that his former high school teammates helped sell him on Auburn.

“They just told me Auburn is a really good school to be at,” Harris told the Web site. “If you come down there, Coach Tuberville makes things happen for you and all the players are really in it for each other.”

The 5-foot-10, 180-pound Stallworth, of Leesville, La., chose Auburn over a scholarship offer from Tulsa. Stallworth, a high-school quarterback who projects as a receiver in college, had also drawn recruiting interest from the likes of Tennessee, Alabama and Florida.

Perkins chose AU over offers from Southern Miss, Louisiana Tech, Louisiana-Monroe and Arkansas State. The 5-foot-9, 180-pounder from Greenville, Miss., rushed for nearly 2,000 yards and 29 touchdowns as a junior.

Rivals.com rates James a three-star prospect. The 5-foot-10, 175-pounder also had scholarship offers from Ole Miss and Mississippi State. He caught 53 passes for 780 yards and 18 touchdowns as a junior.

Moore, an under-the-radar prospect, didn’t have another scholarship offer, though he had received interest from TCU, Texas Tech, Kansas and Nebraska, among others.

The 6-foot-5, 255-pounder is a high-school teammate of standout quarterback Ryan Mossakowski, a Rivals-rated four-star prospect who is one of AU’s top remaining quarterback targets.

Auburn’s next senior camp, a one-day mini-camp, is scheduled for July 12.

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