HOOVER, Ala. — It turns out, Barry Odom’s public frustration with Tennessee was essentially crying over spilt milk.

On Day 1 of SEC Media Days, Missouri’s head coach walked back his biting comments from February when he criticized Jeremy Pruitt’s program for actively recruiting his players following the school’s postseason ban.

NCAA rules stipulate that seniors at such schools are free to transfer without restriction, so when the Tigers were hit with sanctions, the Vols began contacting several seniors.

Odom was miffed at the time, but told Volquest on Monday, "We’re okay.

“Everybody is a competitor and wants to build their team as good as you can build it.”

Odom was singing a much different tune five months ago though when he was at a booster function and said, “Everybody is going to have a bad day. You combine that with somebody that – who’d we beat 50-17 this year? Tennessee? Yeah, those guys. They are non-stop reaching out daily (saying), ‘Hey, come here.’ The grass is not always greener somewhere else.”

He also added that he’d reached out to Tennessee coaches about the contact but never got a return phone call.

Evidently, Odom and Pruitt were able to clear the air at the annual conference in Birmingham earlier this spring, with Missouri’s head coach saying Monday, “It was good to be able to visit.

“I also understand how recruiting goes. We’re okay. Everybody is a competitor and wants to build their team as good as you can build it. When you’ve got good players, that’s a good thing. People want them. I haven’t given it another thought.”

Case closed then?

Maybe?

The whole situation was rather silly in the first place. Why wouldn’t Tennessee inquire about a couple veteran offensive lineman? And Odom, fresh off an excessive bowl ban, seemed justified in his earnest defense of his program.

Where it becomes just classic college football offseason fodder is Odom’s public sanctimony unravelling with the now knowledge of an apparent closed door meeting with his seniors back in January. That and it “wasn’t just one school,” per Odom on Monday, who acknowledged that despite only naming Tennessee, the Vols weren’t the only program to recruit his players.

According to senior linebacker Cale Garrett, Odom gathered the team following the NCAA’s ruling and told the seniors that everyone was “fair game” and "free to talk to other schools.”

So some did.

Garrett, who had 112 tackles in 2018, told Volquest he was not contacted by Tennessee and wouldn’t have had any interest anyways.

“I’m a Missouri boy. I wasn’t going anywhere,” he said.

Remarkably, the Tigers haven’t lost a single player to transfer since the bowl ban.

“None of us ever questioned leaving,” Garrett said.

Odom has clearly built a strong culture in that locker room. He has a good football team this year, too. The Tigers have killed the Vols the last two seasons and project to be one of the better teams in the east in 2019.

But his February frustration appears particularly silly as we now sit here in July.

Perhaps any lingering beef is truly squashed. Guess we’ll find out on November 23.