Tennessee avoids bowl ban, ex-coach hit with significant penalty after NCAA finds ‘hundreds of violations’

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The NCAA came down hard on former Tennessee Volunteers football coach Jeremy Pruitt on Friday after finding more than 200 individual infractions committed by the football program during his three-year run as head coach.  

The decision by the Division I Committee on Infractions comes after Tennessee was sent a notice of allegations last July detailing 18 Level I rules violations against the football program under Pruitt and his staff. 

The Tennessee Volunteers team running through the 'T' before the game against the Florida Gators at Neyland Stadium on September 24, 2022, in Knoxville, Tennessee.  (Donald Page/Getty Images)

Pruitt was fired in January 2021 after three seasons following an internal investigation by the university. 

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The committee said the former head coach had "failed to monitor his staff when at least a dozen members of the football staff committed more than 200 violations of NCAA rules over a two-year period and did not self-report any of those violations."

Pruitt was given a six-year show-cause penalty, meaning he would be suspended for a full season if another NCAA school were to hire him. 

"During the head coach's tenure, he and other members of his staff acted with general and blatant disregard for rules compliance," the panel said.

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Tennessee Volunteers head coach Jeremy Pruitt walks to the sideline during the 2020 TaxSlayer Gator Bowl game between the Indiana University Hoosiers and the Tennessee Volunteers on January 2, 2020, at TIAA Bank Field in Jacksonville,