10 names you need to know as Auburn basketball aims for a loaded 2022 class

Bruce Pearl has wasted no time in swinging for the fences in the class of 2022. Here's a big-picture look at the top prospects to watch.

(Shanna Lockwood/Auburn Athletics)

Like his fellow head coach Bryan Harsin, Bruce Pearl was eagerly anticipating the first day of June.

June 1 meant the end of the longest dead period in modern recruiting history — a time that stretched even longer for college basketball coaches, as the COVID-19 pandemic hit just before the 2019-20 postseason.

“You know, June is gonna be our first back-to-normal month… it’s going to be really busy,” Pearl said in late May. “We’re going to have a lot of prospects in on campus, which is probably more important than actually going out and getting to see prospects. At the same time, we’re putting a new team together. Our freshmen come in June 1st, and so, that’s the same time recruiting starts.

“So there’s going to be a lot going on. The NCAA is going to give us, like, six days in June and I think it might be 10 in July and I’ll be out all those days doing what I do — trying to spend as much time with the young ones and getting caught up a little bit, becaus…