Beat me to it. Not sure why Connor has the hots for a UCF Tennessee match. He mentions "Tennessee" 10 times in his column. Not sure what beating Tennessee would prove for UCF. (Particularly when they're just a couple of years removed from a "National Championship.") Nor why UT should sign up for a series where they'd be lucky to win 1 of 3 right now. Tennessee doesn't need anymore of these monster intersectional, non-conference games. We've got enough competition just trying to win an SEC game at the moment. ___ As for UCF, hiring Malzahn-the coach of the team they beat to win their "national championship" may be a decent hire, but it's an instant Xzibit, Yo Dawg! meme.

Maybe Guz can win a national championship at UCF like Scott Frost did by beating Guz in the Peach Bowl...?

Yawn. Anytime you see an SDS article trying to esplain why, just sleep through it. SDS gonna SDSplain.

We already fired a failed middle school gym teacher (for cause) who was allegedly a DC.

I dare Pruitt to do it. I welcome it. I'll pop some caps. You want butter on your popcorn?

MY GOD A FRESHMAN!

If UT gets shafted by the NCAA, then it means that UT was justified in terminating Pruitt for cause. Choose one. Only one.

Pruitt's entire case rests on the argument that he sucked as a head coach. If he offers “proof” of others being an accessory to his cheating, then it means that he actually did commit the violations and the termination was justified. Case dismissed. Bye bye buyout. A man who lights the fuse to burn a building is an arsonist. A man who tries to compel you to pay him money or else is an extortionist. An arsonist who lights the fuse, then expects to extort money from you while your building is on fire is getting close to the level of idiocracy that Pruitt has pulled. As big as UT's investigation has been, I don’t think Pruitt has anything to say that UT won’t already have presented to the NCAA. So there goes that element of surprise and leverage.

$120k. I've heard that number for a couple of weeks now. SDS just waking up? Last time, UT saved money on the search firm. Crazy Aunt Bev hired Fulmer as AD who hired Skoal Can as the coach. Personally, I'd deduct the $120k from Fulmer's buyout.

Could it have been handled better? Sure. Who had more opportunity to do something about this? Taylor. the warning signs (terrible season, investigation, and ultimately Pruitt's termination) were all there. Who had more at stake? Taylor. In spite of all that (and the fact that other coaches do this), 100% of the blame is assigned to Heupel? I call BS.

If the NCAA is going to punish UT exponentially worse than it should, then that tells you that Chancellor Plowman and UT had sufficient grounds to terminate Pruitt for cause. Which means that Pruitt's lawsuit crumbles too. The logic police would like you to come downtown.

Cite your source. Heupel wasn't the first candidate on the list. If he wasn't the first candidate, then your statement is wrong without any other discussion. QED.

Jay Graham at Alabama? Sigh. Now that's something I wasn't expecting. The original Tide killer at Tuscaloosa. Graham sealed wins over Alabama in 1995 and 1996 with awesome touchdown runs late in the game. Enjoy. You got a guy who brings it every day.

What's worse is that UT has been so slow to get to the FIRE decision. This puts them behind their peers and in a rush to make the HIRE decision. All of it self-inflicted.

I think we tried "not rushing" things in 2017. We wound up never talking to Mullen, offering Schiano, then offering numerous coaches who all said no, then having our AD go off the reservation and offer Mike Leach, get fired for cause, pick up Fulmer as AD (though he'd never been an AD), who hired Pruitt as head coach (though he'd never been a head coach). What I get from this hire is that our AD knows what he's doing, went after some other targets, was turned down, but moved swiftly to secure a good coach before the meme factory could really get cranked up. Oh, and he did this in January when the coaching carousel has stopped. I give him full marks for hitting the ground running.

Paul Finebaum is no longer relevant. Go pick up Saban's toothpick, Paul.

That's the fastest I've ever seen Skoal can make a sound decision.

Well there's several million dollars that aren't being paid to Pruitt so...

Lots of head coaches try to bring their staffs with them. Some succeed. Hope it works. Heupel can't be worse than the Rainsville Skoal Can.

When Bob Stoops got to OU, he recognized how out of shape his team was and he ran the fool out of them. He also brought back former Sooners and openly talked about Sooner Magic. He didn't run from the Sooners past, he embraced it and led his team to do the same. Heupel was there when this happened and he knows exactly what it looks like for a fallen program to get up. I'm under no illusions. There's a lot of recovery and cleanup left to do after the wreck of the Exxon Voldeez that Fulmer has given us. Twice. I'm willing to give him time so long as his teams looked coached and play hard. Welcome, Coach Heupel!

No dude. We can't have a Regular Show singularity of clichés here. It would open up a rift in the time-space continuum that could destroy all matter in the universe.

"Schiano’s loose connections to the Sandusky scandal at Penn State were the biggest reason the hiring was questioned. It has never been proven that Schiano was aware of Sandusky’s crimes." And Schiano has never testified otherwise or filed a defamation suit against McQueary for his testimony naming him. Has he? Well there you go. ___ With competent leadership at UT, Jones would have been fired in October, 2017 after losing to Georgia 41-0. There was a bye week and a chance to regroup and try to get through the rest of the season. Had this been done, then they surely would have hired a new head coach sooner-thus avoiding Schiano altogether. Missed opportunity #2 was when Bahama John Currie decided to fly down to the islands to watch the basketball team instead of getting Dan Mullen on campus and into the boat. Instead, Chip Kelly went to UCLA, Florida went all in on Mullen, and Currie went to...you guessed it, Greg Schiano.

Indeed. Your user name goes to 11.

Not Danny White!? Time to move on to Gary Hogeboom then. lol

Look, we're in our thirteenth year of rebuilding so, just give it a break, willya? Besides, Danny White will have us claiming imaginary national championships in NO TIME!!! All sarcasm and kidding aside, I am impressed that UT seems to have hired a credible AD who has a good background and have done so very quickly. The incessant negative noise would have you believe that UT couldn't hire anybody worth anything at any time forever. I say you've got to get someone who wants to be here, is willing to work, willing to do things the right way, and willing to hold himself and others accountable. Maybe the former Dallas Cowboys backup QB is just that guy.

UT was in a terrible spot when Pruitt was hired. Mel Tucker was one of the other candidates and in hindsight, that guy would have been a home run compared to what we got. He went to Colorado and did okay, then got hired at Michigan State.

Who has more NCAA violations, Pruitt or Freeze? Once we know the answer to that question, then and ONLY THEN can we decide on Freeze. Heck, he might be an improvement over Pruitt! /sarc

+1. I think Pruitt already HAD his chance to cut a deal. Instead, he went for 2 and tried an onsides kick while down 26 points with 3 minutes left in the game.

UT wouldn't have run an investigation on themselves that results in cratering the program just to save money on one more buyout. However, when it became clear that the scope of the Pruitt's mess made cratering the program inevitable, then there's no way that UT would pay Pruitt another dime. That's my 2 cents.

Pruitt has nothing to lose and no choice but to fight back. However, the entire basis of his case is, "Hey, I sucked as a head coach. UT should have fired me for that and paid me!" Pruitt is trying to do a DB Cooper, but forgot the parachute and the money inside the plane, and now is suing to get his money and the parachute. Good luck with that. I'll say this for Pruitt, at least his stupidity is balanced. He did as bad a job at cheating as he did at coaching.