To pay off his end of bet — so to speak — to his starting quarterback, Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze had to follow through on his promise to bring in talent around him. It’s “no secret” Auburn needed help at the wide receiver position, Freeze said.

On National Signing Day, Freeze brought in difference makers he sought out. It’s a four-man group as things stand now, with five-star signees Cam Coleman and Perry Thompson paired with four-star signees Malcolm Simmons and Bryce Cain.

It is without question the best wide receiver class in Auburn’s history.

Auburn had only signed one five-star receiver ever before 2023. In this class alone, it has two.

“It’s no secret, we needed to get some difference-makers at the receiver position,” Freeze said during his National Signing Day press conference. “To land two of the top 10 in the nation in Perry and Cam and then two others that I think are sleepers. But they are ranked in, what, the top 150 in the country? Bryce and Malcolm. Now, they’re going to have to get thrown into the deep end of the pool and swim pretty fast, but I think they have that ability. It changes our offense if we have guys like that on the outside and in the slot that can make plays.”

Freeze called back on his history of recruiting elite receivers while at Ole Miss like Laquan Treadwell, A.J. Brown and DK Metcalf. He has a track record. But Auburn is a different challenge.

This is a football program that has an offense known largely for running the ball. Auburn has only had two 1,000-yard receivers in program history. So how did Auburn pull off this change perception?

Cain was the first to commit in June, Simmons followed in July. It was the beginning of work by Freeze and wide receivers coach Marcus Davis to infuse youth and talent into the wide receiver room. But there were bigger fish on their minds.

“All of our staff put in great effort, but Marcus Davis — he had to spend extra, extra time because of the number of kids we were trying to sign there, too,” Freeze said.

Those players, in-state receivers Thompson and Coleman, were a bigger challenge. Auburn played catchup for them both, as the staff under head coach Bryan Harsin did not heavily pursue either five-star talent. Coleman is ranked as the No. 8 player overall and Thompson the No. 26.

“I think I couldn’t have asked any more out of the effort that it took to try, in a short amount of time, to get into the battles for the top guys,” Freeze said. “Because truthfully the elite schools are always a couple years ahead. We had to close the gap on a lot to get in in those battles. We didn’t win all of them but we sure were in them.”

The effort began immediately for Thompson. When Freeze took over in November 2022, Thompson had already been committed for several months to Alabama. Freeze and Davis went after the Foley receiver immediately. Slowly, the tide of his commitment swung toward an Auburn flip.

Meanwhile, Auburn began to build recruiting momentum elsewhere. Auburn proved to Thompson in mid-July that he was capable of a major flip when it pulled four-star linebacker Demarcus Riddick away from Georgia.

“Alright, so, you can go to the elite right now and help them sustain, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” Freeze said of his recruiting pitch. “You could also choose, if you want to be a trailblazer and do something different and join together with a group of guys and return a program that’s proven it can be there and return it back to that.”

At Auburn’s Big Cat Weekend recruiting event at the end of July, Thompson made a pool-side announcement on an Instagram live-stream. Freeze was right beside him, celebrating as Thompson put on an Auburn hat. A handful of the other recruits in town picked Freeze up and threw him in the pool.

To that point, Thompson was the most notable recruit in Auburn’s class. It was the moment when Auburn legitimized its momentum.

Once he made his pledge, Thompson became one of Auburn’s most vocal recruiters. Turns out, Auburn needed the help.

Coleman committed to Texas A&M in July; it came largely as a surprise to an Auburn staff that thought it had done enough.

“When Cam made his commitment to another school, we immediately said, look, that’s fine, but we’re not going to waiver,” Freeze said. “We’re not going away, and we’re going to fight to the end. We’ll prove to you that we want you more, that we obviously feel like you’re a difference-maker here.”

Freeze and Davis pushed for Coleman throughout the fall. Freeze was seen in Phenix City, Alabama, at one of Coleman’s games. Auburn brought him on campus over multiple football games this season, with Thompson right there alongside.

And while Freeze said he believes he could have landed Coleman regardless, the biggest moment in his recruitment came when Texas A&M fired head coach Jimbo Fisher on Nov. 12.

“Obviously it helped that the other school had a coaching change,” Freeze said. “I’d like to think we were going to win it anyway, but I don’t know if that’s the case or not. I’m glad it worked out the way it did.”

Together, Coleman and Thompson are the top two rated players in Auburn’s 2024 class. Auburn brought in both quality and quantity with its signees on offense. They are the keys to Auburn’s now No. 8-ranked signing class.

And they matter as they will change the way Auburn is going to run its offense. Quarterback Payton Thorne said Monday he is excited to air the ball out next season, to expand the playbook with his new playmakers.

In a way, it all reminds Freeze of his teams at Ole Miss.

“It changed the way we called games,” Freeze said of landing Laquan Treadwell. “I feel like the same about Cam and Perry and Malcolm and Bryce. You combined Walker with those, I think we did pretty good at the skill positions.”

Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at [email protected]