Enrique Davis

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Mosley's Davis chooses Auburn

Mosley’s Davis chooses Auburn

10/16/06

By Pat McCann

Executive Sports Editor 747-5068 / pmccann@pcnh.com

LYNN HAVEN

Enrique Davis knew that he liked Auburn a lot. Saturday night’s game at Auburn, Ala., against then second-ranked Florida surely didn’t make him like the Tigers any less.

The Mosley running back acknowledged Sunday that he has made a verbal commitment to play football at Auburn, becoming the second Bay County football player within a week to make his intentions clear to a Southeastern Conference school. Bay’s Bert Reed said at midweek he would play at Florida.

“Basically I had been talking to the coaches awhile … I didn’t want to take too long,” Davis said Sunday evening. “I’d been getting calls from schools across the nation and getting tagged and tagged. Basically I knew where I wanted to go and it was getting to be kind of a burden to tell the truth.”

Davis, a 6-foot, 215-pound running back who said he’d been timed as fast as 4.38 in the 40-yard dash, rushed for more than 1,800 yards and scored 24 touchdowns as a junior. While being targeted by every defense he has faced this season, he still has managed more than 800 yards rushing and 12 touchdowns in only six games.

Davis’ stature as a nationwide recruit increased exponentially after he was named MVP of a Nike football camp at the University of Georgia that he attended with teammate Tommie Rogers last summer.

“All the running backs went one on one in drills. There were 800 or 900 players there from across the country, from every position,” he said.

“I was surprised when they called my name as MVP. Then I got calls from scouts from all over. My stock really raised right then.”

Davis’ late father, Henry, was a cornerback at the University of Florida, but he said his focus has remained on making his own footprints, not trying to trace ones from decades past.

“I was getting calls from everywhere,” he said, “all the way to Nebraska. I basically was offered by every school in the nation. I’d narrowed my list to Auburn, FSU, LSU, N.C. State, South Carolina and Georgia, and I liked Alabama a lot.”

He’d already made recruiting visits to Auburn, Florida State, Florida and Alabama he said. At Florida State, he said he became friends with running back Lorenzo Booker, and they continue to talk often on the phone.

A trip to Auburn in early August, when he spent a lot of time with Tigers all-SEC running back Kenny Irons, made the Tigers the frontrunner.

“In truth, I already knew where I was going. It’s been awhile, but I kept it to myself,” Davis said. “Ever since I went to Auburn and hung out with Kenny Irons. He showed me some tape and told me how he reads defenses. He showed me around the place and I had a great time with him.

“I felt like it was really right.”

Davis said he also attended the Auburn-LSU game this season. Tigers head coach Tommy Tuberville then checked in on the field with him prior to Mosley’s game at Tallahassee Leon late last month.

The clincher may have been prior to the kickoff of Auburn vs. Florida, however.

“When I got there I went through the Tiger Walk, and the fans saw me and everyone was going crazy,” Davis said. “When I got to Auburn more fans know me than anywhere else. Everyone at the Tiger Walk knew who I was.

“Little kids were asking me for my autograph. Then the student section went crazy when I walked in. I got to meet a lot of the students after the game.”

Davis said he qualified academically as a junior with a score of 24 on the ACT. He credited Mosley coach Perry Brown, whose run-oriented style showcased Davis’ running abilities when Brown came to Mosley last season, as well as his mother and his stepfather, Kenneth Gray.

He said his initial plans are to major in communications and speech.

“It’s the opportunity of a lifetime,” he said. “When you hear of Auburn, you think of running backs.”