Syracuse football coach Dino Babers recruited for his competitors Sunday, urging high school football players to go to Penn State, Pitt, Rutgers or Army if they wanted. He had a reason.

Babers told more than 2,000 players at the annual Lauren’s First & Goal football camp that he wanted to see them stay, and play, close to home. He insisted that there was “enough talent on this football field to win a national championship in the Northeast."

Babers then raised eyebrows by saying, “Go to Penn State” and “Go to Rutgers” before finding a player in the crowd wearing a Pitt shirt.

“Go to Pitt,” the Syracuse coach said to 2,000 gasps. “Did he just say that? Yeah. Go to Pitt. I’d rather see one of those schools do it with people at home than to [see players] run down to Clemson, Alabama or Florida State. You can play your ball right here.”

Babers began what he called the busiest three weeks of his year by bringing his staff to the 16th annual Lauren’s First & Goal camp, held at Lafayette College’s Metzgar Fields. The camp drew players from 17 states and, this year, from Mexico, Germany and Austria via international football organizations.

More than 300 college coaches attended, including much of Penn State’s staff (led by head coach James Franklin) and the Army West Point staff, for which camp organizer John Loose works.

Loose, a former Lafayette assistant, began the camp in 2004 with his wife Marianne to honor their daughter Lauren, a survivor of pediatric brain tumors. Lauren Loose, 22, spoke to the campers, urging them to follow their dreams no matter the obstacles.

The nation’s largest one-day football camp, Lauren’s First & Goal raised more than $115,000 on Sunday for pediatric brain-tumor research and cancer services. Since its formation in 2004, the foundation has donated more than $2 million.

Babers marveled at those totals, as he did at the number of kids attending the camp. Looking across the sea of players representing Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Maryland and elsewhere, Babers said he could put together a pretty good team.

“There’s like 2,000 kids here, and you’re telling me there’s not 20 who can help you win — and you can pick the 20?” Babers said. "Yeah, you can win a national championship with them. I can."

A college football team from the traditional Northeast or mid-Atlantic markets hasn’t won a national championship since Penn State in the 1986 season. Noting the recent run of champions (Alabama, Clemson, Auburn and Florida State have combined to win nine of 10 titles), Babers urged the campers to bring those trophies back to the region.

“I’m not going to turn this into a Syracuse thing. I’m going to turn this into a Northeast thing," Babers said. "… Why do we have to go down there and give them all the trophies, when we can stay up here and win our own?"

Babers even mentioned other schools, such as Penn State (“I said it, I know James”) and Army (“Go to Army, love it!”). He also pitched Syracuse, noting that his team led Clemson until the last minute of a 27-23 loss last season.

“You guys get together and say, ‘You know what? We’ll go to Syracuse and we’ll win a national championship,’ you’re doggone right we will,” Babers said.

Babers attended the camp just two days after speaking in Arizona at the funeral of Dick Tomey, his coach at Hawaii. The visit began a three-week tour of camps and clinics that Babers said would be busier than the football season.

Before departing, Babers left the players at the Lauren’s First & Goal camp with a final thought.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “Whether it’s Penn State, Pitt, Rutgers, you name it, you guys get together, stay together and make the Northeast what it’s always been: the beast.”

-- By Mark Wogenrich, The Morning Call, Allentown, Pennsylvania