Tennessee Football: Jeremy Pruitt’s big deal

New Tennessee football head coach Jeremy Pruitt coordinates the Alabama Crimson Tide defense one more time Monday night in the College Football National Championship game. When the game clock ticks to 00.00, he becomes the full-time head coach for the Tennessee Volunteers. It’s not a big deal.

Jeremy Pruitt works one more day for Nick Saban at Alabama before giving his full-time attention the Tennessee football head coaching job.

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It’s not a big deal. Pruitt is the second defensive coordinator in two years to prepare the Alabama defense for the College Football Playoff while a new SEC head coach. That other guy was Kirby Smart, the coach of the Georgia Bulldogs who will face Alabama and Pruitt’s defense.

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Big deal recruiting

Actually, it is a big deal because this year the NCAA instituted an early football signing period.

“I’ll be honest with you, I sympathize with Jeremy,” Smart said

“The fact he had to deal with a signing day while he was there, I wouldn’t wish that (on anybody).”

Are there going to be awkward moments on the recruiting trail because of Pruitt’s status as part Alabama coach part Tennessee football head coach? Most certainly not, according to Kirby Smart.

“The thing about it is, the guys on these staffs, we’re all friends, and there is not going to be any recruit that’s going to get in the way of our friendship, if that makes sense,” Pruitt said.

No, it doesn’t make any sense at all, especially since Smart took advantage of Pruitt’s status in a very unfriendly way to poach Cade Mays,  the nation’s number two ranked offensive tackle, off of the Tennessee football commitment list. To add insult to injury, Mays is from Knoxville and is the top 2018 prospect in Tennessee.

Big deal coaching

The National Championship game itself places new Tennessee football head coach/current Alabama defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt opposite his new Tennessee defensive coordinator/current Georgia linebackers coach Kevin Sherrer, who was also Pruitt’s teammate at Alabama. The pair also coached together at Alabama.

I’ll try to get you a program so you can keep up.

Smart seemed to lay a guilt trip on Sherrer when addressing Sherrer and Pruitt opposing each other.

“I know that Kevin wants to win this game for the University of Georgia, and Kevin wants to finish something he was a part of,” Smart said. “I think it speaks to his brand the rest of his career if he’s able to win a National Championship here, and I certainly think Lorenzo Carter, Davin Bellamy, all the kids he’s coached for the last four years I guess it’s been, and he wants to do well for those guys, and I’m sure Jeremy is the same way for the players that he recruited to Alabama.”

Big deal guilt

The biggest problem Jeremy Pruitt faces is not the competition, but that pesky detail of only 24 hours existing in a day.

“To me, it’s a little bit of a feeling of guilt,” Pruitt said. “You almost feel like as I’m sitting here working on this game, should I be doing something to the place I’m about to go?”

Pruitt somehow took time yesterday to hire another assistant coach, Tino Sunseri, a football staffer at Florida State.

Following the Smart example

At least Kirby Smart sympathizes, and no one at Alabama is complaining. “Right now, he has one job. He’s the Alabama defensive coordinator,” Alabama safety Minkah Fitzpatrick said . “There hasn’t been any change at all.”

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Pruitt has had an example to follow, that guy Smart again. “I watched him juggle the two jobs, and he did a really good job with it — probably much better than I’m doing, but I did get to learn a lot from it,” Pruitt said.

And he has Smart’s sympathy, sort of.