Tennessee head basketball coach Donnie Tyndall yells to his players in Knoxville.It is what it is.
Those were first-year Tennessee men's basketball coach Donnie Tyndall's words of choice last week when asked about an NCAA investigation concerning his time at Southern Miss before he got the UT job last spring.
But just exactly what "it" is isn't yet known.
Are these potential violations viewed as serious enough to turn Donnie Knoxville into Donnie Dismissed before his opening season with the Vols comes to a close?
Or is this much adieu about nothing, or at least next to nothing, something so insignificant as to be completely forgiven and forgotten by the time Tyndall's done enough good things in Big Orange Country to become known as Donnie Dynasty?
Nothing's known at this time, though the investigation reportedly centers on how tuition and other expenses were paid for players signed by Southern Mississippi who were not yet eligible for financial aid because of academic issues. The NCAA allows such players to take classes to gain eligibility, but they're on their own financially until they're academically eligible.
If true, such allegations are serious. Especially considering Tyndall's Morehead State program also ran afoul of NCAA rules during his time there, though those were blamed on a rogue booster.
The Big Orange brass, especially athletic director Dave Hart, best hope that there's no "rogue booster" at the head of the Southern Miss mess, lest the NCAA might see an unwelcome pattern of rogue boosters turning up wherever Tyndall does.
Even without a pattern, Dave Hart's hiring of Tyndall might have the AD in much more hot water with the average Volniac if Josh Dobbs hadn't rallied the UT football team to an overtime win at South Carolina 10 days ago.
After all, without that win, Hart's signature hire to date -- Butch Jones -- was beginning to be questioned. And if Jones was seen as a negative regarding Hart, an investigation into Tyndall's career at Southern Miss before he ever coached an official game with the Vols would really call Hart's hiring skills into question.
But Dobbs has at least momentarily returned a largely positive glow to Butch's "brick-by-brick" approach. In fact, let UT win at least two of its final three football games against Kentucky, Missouri and Vanderbilt without ever leaving the Volunteer State -- the Vandy game's in Nashville the Saturday after Thanksgiving -- and most of the Big Orange Nation will answer any question concerning Tyndall with a two-word response: "Donnie Who?'
This isn't to say that UT fans, Hart and Tyndall shouldn't worry going forward, however. Especially Tyndall. While he skated on the Morehead charges, it won't be quite so easy to escape unscathed from two NCAA investigations in successive jobs.
Maybe there really is nothing else Tyndall and the current Vols players can say about this unwelcome distraction other than what they said following Saturday night's exhibition win over Lenoir-Rhyne, when the coach proclaimed:
"It's not going to be a distraction at all. I'm not going to comment on that, again, until the end and the whole deal is over. All I'll say is it won't be a distraction, we won't let it be a distraction and it shouldn't be a distraction."
So there.
And given that NCAA investigations tend to move at the rate of pre-global warming glaciers, it quite possibly won't be a distraction on the court for this year's Vols.
But until or unless the NCAA announces its investigation closed, it already appears to be a major distraction for Tyndall's recruiting. The Vols lost their highest-rated verbal commitment at the end of last week when four-star guard Chris Clarke reversed his verbal from UT to Virginia Tech, though his father swore the NCAA investigation had nothing to do with it.
Nevertheless, let this drag out all winter without a solution and Tyndall's Year Two could be less satisfactory than Year One.
Nor will the fan base be able to distract itself with another ill-advised "Bring Back Bruce (Pearl)" petition as it did a year ago when it wrongly ran off Cuonzo Martin. Pearl's now at Auburn where he recently proclaimed, "I'm an Auburn man now."
As long as the football Vols can reach a bowl game this season, Hart is a lucky man. But at some point the words of an unnamed source to CBSSports.com regarding Tyndall's Southern Miss issues will return to the spotlight.
Said the source regarding how more savvy coaching staffs might have attempted to skirt the same NCAA rules Tyndall may have broken: "This was way sloppier."
So, too, may have been Hart's vetting of his new men's basketball coach.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com