Auburn entered its preseason practices already with momentum coming off two statement recruiting wins — flipping 5-star linebacker Demarcus Riddick from Georgia and 5-star wide receiver Perry Thompson from Alabama.

Before Riddick’s commitment, Auburn hadn’t landed a 5-star recruit since 2019. It then got both Riddick and Thompson within four days.

So how did Auburn pull such a quick turnaround? Linebackers coach Josh Aldridge only needed one word.

“Effort,” Aldridge said.

That’s a sentiment shared by many high school coaches around Alabama, who said they simply just didn’t hear from Auburn while Bryan Harsin was the head coach.

New head coach Hugh Freeze, Aldridge and the rest of the staff have been tasked with rebuilding those recruiting bridges. That certainly takes effort, but has already yielded results.

“I feel like everybody’s been seeing his recruiting trail so far,” Auburn tight end Tyler Fromm said of Freeze. “And he’s just been working his tail off there.”

While Aldridge can’t talk about Riddick specifically because he hasn’t signed his National Letter of Intent, the linebackers coach was a crucial part of landing the in-state linebacker. His commitment legitimized Auburn to once again be a player for top players within Alabama’s borders.

“This place sells itself, I have said it before,” Aldridge said. “I’m very blessed to be able to recruit for Auburn. I’m very passionate about it. It’s like living a dream to be able to recruit for a place like this. We work really hard at it because everybody else in our league works really hard at it. We’re going to try to keep it rolling.”

Recruiting websites like 247Sports and On3 both have Auburn’s 2024 class ranked in the top 20 overall and both rank Auburn as the fourth overall group based on the average rating of each recruit.

During his press conference before Auburn’s first fall practice, Freeze said he’s been able to be especially active in recruiting because of his hire of offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery’s ability to run the show if he’s out on a trip.

“I was pretty decent at recruiting,” Freeze said. “I had a good plan and a good plan for the staff. I’m not really shocked. I think it’s easy to recruit to Auburn. This is one of the elite programs in the country. Maybe we haven’t had the production in the last few years that is expected. I wasn’t here, I don’t know. And so I’m not really surprised that you can recruit at Auburn.”