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Josh Heupel and the Tennessee Volunteers finally learned of the punishments the NCAA would send down after more than 200 violations between 2018-2020. They were investigated during the tenure of former head coach Jeremy Pruitt.
When making an appearance on the Paul Finebaum Show, the Tennessee Volunteers head coach was excited about this being over and made it clear that it was a previous regime and no one on the current staff has done anything wrong.
"It had nothing to do with our current staff, we weren't there. People tried to use it against us in recruiting. Now it's over and we have the opportunity to go compete for Championships." h/t The Spun
The Tennessee Volunteers will have to pay $8 million in fines, but will not receive a postseason ban. It will be interesting to see how Josh Heupel will be able to move forward with the program in the next handful of years.
How does the NCAA ruling affect Josh Heupel and the Tennessee Volunteers?
The Tennessee Volunteers are going to get hit a little bit overall from this ruling, but it could have been a lot worse for them. They lost scholarships and recruiting visits and that is going to hurt head coach Josh Heupel a bit. However, with the NCAA Transfer Portal, they should be able to bounce back and make up for the losses.
The only question is the scholarship loss as players are going to want to not have to pay for schooling. Not having scholarships to give out is going to put the Vols behind the eight-ball. They can get creative with NIL deals and boosters though to get that situated.
The other portion that Heupel and the university should be thrilled about is the fact that the program did not receive the death penalty or a postseason ban. There are other things the coaching staff is going to have to navigate, but having the opportunity for postseason play gives them hope still.
This Tennessee Volunteers coaching staff was not the ones that were there when the violations happened. The university cleared house and Heupel brought back hope for the program to do things the right way.
It might limit their player pool for the next handful of years, but it could have been a lot worse. Josh Heupel and his staff will be creative about roster construction as people are still going to want to play SEC football.
