NCAA hearing: Tennessee says Jeremy Pruitt, staff secretly committed violations during rules training

CINCINNATI – University of Tennessee says Jeremy Pruitt and his football staff secretly committed NCAA recruiting violations while being trained on the same rules they were breaking.

That argument should take center stage at this NCAA infractions hearing, where UT is arguing that Pruitt deceived the university while taking part in a major recruiting violations. Pruitt is arguing that rules were broken by his subordinates without his knowledge.

An NCAA Committee on Infractions panel is weighing their claims in Day 2 of the hearing.

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UT’s best example of Pruitt's alleged deception occurred during one week in October 2020. And it’s the foundation of the university’s argument against an NCAA allegation that it failed to monitor the football program.

UT alleges that in consecutive weekends in October 2020, Pruitt’s coaches and staff hosted recruits on impermissible visits and provided more than $5,000 in cash or gifts to recruits, their families and high school coaches.

In between those impermissible visits, UT’s compliance staff held a training session with the football staff on NCAA recruiting rules. Coaches and recruiting staff were told about the COVID-19 dead period, which prohibited schools from hosting recruits and their coaches from in-person contact.

“This meeting occurred two days after an impermissible visit provided to (unnamed recruit) and two days before an impermissible visit provided to (unnamed recruit),” UT said in its November response to the NCAA notice of allegations, in which student-athletes’ names were redacted.

How UT argument can be utilized in hearing

UT, Pruitt and former defensive coordinator Derrick Ansley are facing an NCAA infractions panel for their part in 18 highest-level violations alleged to have been committed from 2018 to early 2021.

Pruitt and UT's contingent are here, but Ansley is not. He likely has participated through a Zoom call, which an NCAA spokesperson confirmed is available in the hearing room.

The hearing is closed to the public and media. And under member-imposed confidentiality rules, neither the NCAA nor the involved parties or school can comment about the case until the Committee on Infractions releases its full decision.

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But UT showed its strategy in a 108-page response sent to the NCAA. It’s arguing that Pruitt and his staff knew what they were doing was wrong and intentionally kept the university in the dark.

Pruitt argues that he didn’t know what his assistant coaches and recruiting staff members were doing.

The specifics of his claim have not been revealed publicly because UT declined a public records request by Knox News to see Pruitt’s response to the NCAA. It cited Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and Tennessee Code bylaws that deal with confidentiality of intercollegiate athletics programs.

Jeremy Pruitt warned of suspension in 2020

In October 2020, that training session on NCAA rules for Pruitt and his staff wasn’t a one-time event.

UT says compliance staff provided Pruitt and his coaches with guidance on NCAA recruiting restrictions on 30 separate occasions from April to December of 2020.

On Sept. 8, 2020, assistant athletics director of compliance Adam Tate attended a daily football staff meeting, which was his routine. When they discussed recruiting restrictions, Tate warned Pruitt that a head coach could be suspended if they committed violations.

According to UT's report, Pruitt’s staff hosted recruits on impermissible visits one week before and one week after that warning.

How recruiting was kept 'secret' during pandemic

The NCAA investigation found that much of the violations occurred during that COVID-19 dead period in 2020.

It alleges that six recruits made a combined nine visits to Knoxville from July to November 2020, and they were paid $12,173 by assistant coach Brian Niedermeyer and recruiting director Bethany Gunn.

According to the investigation, some of that money given to recruits paid for their hotel, transportation, restaurant and other accommodations during their unofficial visits. Gunn or Niedermeyer usually paid the hotel in cash before the recruit arrived.

Universities are supposed to pay expenses for official visits, but recruits must pay their own for unofficial visits. However, no visits were permitted at that time because of the pandemic.

During one of those visits, Gunn sent a text message to an individual that stressed the importance of keeping their recruiting actions “secret” from the compliance department.

That individual’s name was redacted from UT’s report, indicating it was a recruit, a player or a booster.

Niedermeyer, who now coaches high school football at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, already has accepted a multi-year show-cause penalty That means he is not allowed to coach or recruit in college for a period of time unless his future employer can successfully argue otherwise to the NCAA.

Adam Sparks is the Tennessee football beat reporter. Email adam.sparks@knoxnews.com. Twitter @AdamSparks. Support strong local journalism by subscribing at knoxnews.com/subscribe.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Tennessee says Jeremy Pruitt secretly committed NCAA violations