Steven Pearl says Auburn planned for Bruce Pearl retirement - ESPN

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Bruce Pearl's retirement last month was a surprise to his Auburn team and even his son Steven, who succeeded his father as the Tigers' new head coach.

But Pearl's announcement was not a shock to everyone.

Steven Pearl said he didn't officially know about his father's decision until the day before the Tigers' first practice. Bruce Pearl, however, had told Auburn athletic director John Cohen years ago that he had been thinking about retirement.

«Three years ago, [my father] told him, like, 'Listen, I don't know how much longer I'm going to do this,'» Steven said Wednesday at SEC media day. «So [Cohen] has been actively, in his mind, being prepared for this for three years now and going through all the different options of, 'Do I bring in an outside coaching staff? Do I bring in a big-name guy or watch this grow? Does the staff grow as a unit and stay together and not go chasing other assistant jobs, not go chasing other coaching jobs?' And he ultimately felt like the staff had earned the right and the opportunity to continue to move this thing forward.»

Bruce Pearl's retirement followed months of speculation that he would leave coaching to pursue Alabama's open U.S. Senate seat that had been vacated by Tommy Tuberville, the former Auburn football coach who is now running for governor of the state.

Steven said the past three weeks have been, as expected, a frenzy. But he also said his time with his father — he played for his father at Tennessee and spent more than a decade as his assistant — helped prepare him for the role at Auburn, which is ranked 20th in the Associated Press Top 25 preseason poll.

«As far as when it hit me, it didn't hit me until I showed up at the gym and [my father] was filming his