Hello and welcome back to Power Hour, the athletics Tuesday National College Football

podcast hosted by yours truly, Nicole Auerbach.

I am thrilled to be joined by my friend and colleague Chris Vinini here to break down the biggest

stories in college football in an hour or less. And before we get going, I do want to remind

everyone if you enjoy the podcast to please subscribe, rate, and review us on iTunes or wherever you're

getting your podcast, the Andy Staples and Friends show, five stars.

Because much like your favorite recruits, we want to make an immediate impact.

And Chris, we're going to talk about recruiting because Tennessee now has a bunch of kids who just signed with a coach who is no

longer the coach and also has to recruit for the foreseeable future without a coach as well.

But let's start with Tennessee making a coaching change that had basically been telegraphed

for, I don't know, a month now. Walk me through as someone who is super plugged in in coaching changes and the hiring

and firing cycles, when this began and how it ultimately got to Jeremy Pruitt being fired

for cause mid-January.

Yeah, so mid-January, not the ideal time to make a coaching change, but this was also not really a surprise if you'd been following Tennessee at all for the last month.

The school had pretty openly hired some lawyers to investigate possible, you know, impermissible benefits

and recruiting violations at its own school.

Largely, it's believed because they were looking for a way to get out of the, I think,

nearly $13 million buyout owed to Pruitt, a buyout that largely increased because of a contract extension he got five months ago coming off of an eight and five season.

Turned out that wasn't a good idea.

And on Monday they did it.

They fired Pruitt and they said they fired him with cause.

He won't get any of that buyout and they also fired two assistant

...