Will Vols Learn A Lesson?

Dave Hart

The University of Tennessee fired its second serial cheater basketball coach in four years on Friday. Only time will tell whether athletic department officials have learned their lesson.

Less than one year after his hiring, Donnie Tyndall was dismissed as men's head coach with a letter that detailed a string of NCAA violations with which he is expected to be charged from his tenure as men's coach at Southern Mississippi University. He had previously been charged with violations when he was coach at Morehead State University.

Almost exactly four years ago, the university fired Bruce Pearl for several NCAA violations, and he later was penalized by the NCAA for lying about the issue. He'd also been involved in a recruiting kerfuffle years ago as an assistant at the University of Iowa.

In the high pressure, high paying, high stakes world of college basketball, it's nothing to give successful coaches a second chance if they've been dinged by the NCAA and paid their penalty. But UT had just been through the NCAA wringer with another coach. In hindsight, it appears Tyndall wasn't vetted closely enough.

UT athletics director Dave Hart, though, said at a news conference Friday that the departed coach had been vetted carefully. Not taking any chances, he also said in so many words he wouldn't consider anyone for the Vols' next coach with NCAA trouble in his background and that a search firm would be employed to assist in the hire.

If nothing else, UT did hedge its bets when it hired the now-departed coach. Because he violated a clause the school wrote in his contract, it won't owe him anything further.