After a month of waiting, it appears to finally be happening. The first report of Tennessee football moving on from head coach Jeremy Pruitt came shortly after noon on Monday. Pete Thamel of Yahoo Sports first broke the news, and the Knoxville News Sentinel followed, saying that he was fired for cause.
Thamel initially reported that Phillip Fulmer’s future as athletic director would be addressed. However, then Brent Hubbs of VolQuest reported just a few minutes later that Fulmer was set to retire form his position. David Ubben of The Athletic reported outside linebackers coach Shelton Felton and inside linebackers coach Brian Niedermeyer were also fired for cause.
These moves come amidst a serious NCAA investigation into the Tennessee football program related to recruiting violations. Thamel, KnoxNews and Ubben all initially tweeted out their reports that Pruitt was fired.
Sources: Tennessee will be parting ways with coach Jeremy Pruitt today. AD Phil Fulmer's future will also be addressed.
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) January 18, 2021
NEWS: Tennessee football coach Jeremy Pruitt has been fired for cause, according to UT sources with knowledge of the situation. His firing ends one of the worst coaching tenures in Vols history. https://t.co/p25iBstPlv
— Knox News (@knoxnews) January 18, 2021
Tennessee assistants Shelton Felton and Brian Niedermeyer are also being fired for cause.
— David Ubben (@davidubben) January 18, 2021
Pruitt has been head coach on Rocky Top for three years. During that time, UT went 16-19, 10-16 in the SEC and made one bowl appearance, winning the Gator Bowl over the Indiana Hoosiers to end the 2019 season.
However, the program has been under investigation for about a month. The investigation was initially reported by Trey Wallace on Fan Run Radio the day of the Vols’ final game against the Texas A&M Aggies.
Serious recruiting violations, including alleged payments to certain players, were reportedly part of the investigation. Eric Gray, whose name seemed to come up a lot in the reporting on the investigation, missed UT’s final game against Texas A&M. We wrote about everything we knew related to the investigation in a report here.
There were signs that could have gone both ways regarding Tennessee football and Pruitt over the past week. Hiring Kevin Steele despite a reported hiring freeze by Mark Schlabach of ESPN was highly suspicious, which we wrote about here.
Then, as we reported Friday, a series of stories from the coaches trying to convince Henry To’o To’o to stay to numerous staff members being interviewed about the investigation to Derrick Ansley being a candidate for another job made everything very confusing. Joe Osovet speaking with UCF was also a big question, as we reported here.
It’s not shocking that Fulmer would retire along with Pruitt being fired. During the disastrous coaching search of 2017, all signs suggested Fulmer orchestrated a coup to get John Currie out of there and take over. He then handpicked Pruitt to lead Tennessee football into the future. They tied their futures together. As a result, Fulmer leaving amidst Pruitt’s firing makes sense.