Tennessee’s Josh Richardson is greeted by coach Donnie Tyndall during an NCAA college basketball game against South Carolina on Saturday, March 7, 2015, in Knoxville.KNOXVILLE — Dave Hart again defended the vetting process in the coaching search that produced the hire of Donnie Tyndall, but Tennessee’s athletic director also owned up to the mistake of tabbing a coach whom the Volunteers fired Friday amid an NCAA investigation into his former program.
After gleaning from a conversation with NCAA officials on Thursday that it was “highly likely” the NCAA would charge Tyndall with major violations stemming from an investigation into academic misconduct and impermissible financial aid at Southern Mississippi, Tennessee fired Tyndall after just one season.
During a news conference late Friday morning, Hart acknowledged in hindsight that hiring Tyndall, who had a prior run-in with the NCAA while at Morehead State, was a mistake despite what he thought was a standard search process.
“I think we vetted that very well,” he said. “It was very similar to any search I’ve ever been involved in in terms of the vetting. When we vet a candidate, we talk to key people on the campus, the athletics director, the president, the compliance people.
“We vet, also, within the industry, people that know the candidate, people that have either worked for or coached against or know the candidate. We vet it with the NCAA. We say, ‘Are there any issues at the institution that this individual is working at.’