Mother of country’s No. 1 recruit: Auburn lack of communication ‘disheartening’
Published:
Defensive tackle Rashan Gary is the No. 1 recruit for the Class of 2016, and his mother isn’t happy with Auburn.
The reports that Auburn defensive coordinator Will Muschamp, who has been involved in the recruitment of Gary, was leaving to become the head coach at South Carolina upset his mother, Jennifer Coney, according to SEC Country.
As expected, Gary is being recruited by several schools, but he’s dwindled his choices to a few schools. In recent weeks, he’s taken official visits to Ole Miss (Nov. 21) and Michigan (Sept. 25). Last weekend, he took an official visit to Auburn (Nov. 28), and his mother joined him.
According to SEC Country, Coney spoke at length with Muschamp and got the impression that he wouldn’t be leaving his position at the school. Obviously that’s changed over the past week, and the Auburn staff hasn’t reached out to the mother or her son.
She described the lack of communication as “disheartening.”
“Just communicate,” Coney said. “Let us know what’s going on. And nobody has. (Southern Cal) has reached out to me, and I spoke with the new coach. Of course, (Jim) Harbaugh has. That’s about it.”
The Tigers are just one of several SEC schools who have offered Gary, including Alabama, Florida, Georgia, LSU, Missouri, Ole Miss, South Carolina and Tennessee.
On Sunday, reports came to light confirming Muschamp was expected to get a second shot as a head coach in Columbia, reminding Coney why her son should should prioritize committing to a program over committing to a coach.
“This exemplifies why you can’t — when it’s time to go to college — think about the coaching staff,” Coney told SEC Country. “Think about where you want to go to school. If football wasn’t there, would you want to go to school there? And that’s pretty much how we’re going to go about this.”
According to Coney, Alabama and Georgia haven’t communicated with her while being in the midst of coaching changes while Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh did with the news that former defensive coordinator D.J. Durkin was headed to Maryland.
Born and raised in Gainesville, Talal joined SDS in 2015 after spending 2 years in Bristol as an ESPN researcher. Previously, Talal worked at The Gainesville Sun.
