Tennessee Football: Is it time to part ways with Jeremy Pruitt?

Tennessee Football’s season has come to an end, so now AD Phillip Fulmer could be faced with a tough decision, especially after recent developments.

Tennessee football’s season is finally over, after a dreadful year. We’ll have to wait around to see if Jeremy Pruitt accepts a bowl bid for later this month, but if he doesn’t, his season is over and his career as Tennessee’s head coach is as well.

The Vols lost to Texas A&M 34-13 in a less than exciting game on Saturday to end the regular season. That puts Tennessee’s regular-season record at 3-7 in a very underachieving season.

Texas A&M dominated the Vols, and the Aggies offense put on a show and added to their case to get into the College Football Playoff. Texas A&M had over 500 total yards of offense and kept the ball for 44 of the 60 minutes.

The Vols are also currently under investigation by the NCAA as well as the compliance department at the university. The investigation is over alleged impermissible benefits, and recruiting violations, with the players involved still being on Tennessee’s roster.

There’s a lot still happening in this situation, and I don’t expect it to end anytime soon, but the university could use this to get under Pruitt’s contract and avoid paying his buyout. If Pruitt is fired, then we’ll be under a new coaching search, but I don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves.

Pruitt has to know that the timing of this isn’t an accident. Although the season was two games less than a normal season, he just coached one of the worst football seasons in Tennessee history.

This is going to be a mess, and as someone who enjoys a little chaos, I’m not necessarily opposed to it. If Tennessee had a decent season, then I might have a different opinion on that, but I don’t think a little more craziness to close out 2020 won’t hurt us too bad.

The only thing is, if the Vols want to sign a notable head coach to take over for Pruitt, they’re going to have to get rid of Pruitt fast because we’re in the offseason, so schools are going to try to put pen to paper for the coaches at the top of the list as soon as possible.

If the Vols are going to keep Pruitt, assistant coaches need to be fired, and Tennessee needs to spend some money on good, proven assistants to improve Tennessee’s team.

Things could be getting spicy on Rocky Top as we head into the offseason. Coming into Saturday before this news broke, I thought Tennessee would have a fairly quiet regular season by changing a few assistant coaches and keeping quiet, but it looks like we’re at the beginning of another fun (if that’s how you’re willing to describe it) offseason.