Pruitt: Vols don't have enough guys, need more to 'do it the right way'

Butch Jones had nothing and everything to do with Tennessee’s 58-21 loss to No. 1 Alabama.

After the Tide’s 12th-straight win in the series on Saturday, the Vols’ former head coach received a Gatorade bath and gleefully jumped into every photo he could enjoying a victory cigar.

The lack of self-awareness is comical, but that’s not the point here. The lasting skid-marks from Jones’ tenure though?

Those stains are as evident as the thick smoke waffling inside Neyland Stadium, or the frustration seeping out of Jeremy Pruitt’s exasperated voice during and after the game.

Once again Saturday, the Tide looked unbeatable, and the talent disparity between the two teams was exactly why the main who took over for Jones was talking about recruiting at halftime and postgame Saturday. After 10 minutes, Alabama was up 28-0 and went on to score the most points any opponent has ever registered in Neyland Stadium.

Pruitt hasn’t experienced much losing in his career and certainly not like that.

“I don’t think it takes much to look, if you look at their sideline and look at our sideline, it don’t hardly look the same,” Pruitt said after the loss.

“We didn’t have enough guys out there today that wanted to do it the right way."

Tennessee took a handful of water balloons to a gun fight on Saturday, and just as frustratingly for Pruitt, sometimes the Vols simply soaked themselves. They were sloppy and undisciplined throughout the game. And even when the coaches made calls, the Vols either missed the boat or didn’t execute. The mistakes left Pruitt more than miffed.

“There were some guys on our team that this game was way too big for them,” Pruitt said.

"I think everybody was able to see that. It’s pretty telling. When you have guys man-to-man when they run down the field and you don’t even guard them, and you can’t keep your poise enough to look to the sideline and get the defensive call, that’s pretty elementary. I know (Alabama’s) signals, I watched their calls. They kind of made the same calls we made. You call a corner blitz, we tippy-toe in there and nobody blocks us and they throw a 50-yard touchdown.

"I bet you when they called the corner blitz, I bet you their corner didn’t tippy-toe up in there.”

Pruitt didn’t call out guys by name, but in the locker room he made sure his team knew “not doing it the right way” won’t cut it moving forward.

“We had to have more people come to play,” safety Nigel Warrior said.

“It has to be in your heart.”

After such an exhilarating win over Auburn a week ago, Tennessee didn’t appear like it ever left The Plains. Last week, the Vols displayed growth and confidence. But that same belief was gone Saturday. Talent is one problem, but weeding out the team’s continued defeatist mentality is another whole issue entirely.

“I promise you, I will recruit 25 other guys that will play the right way so we don’t have to play in another game like this,” he told CBS at halftime.

Pruitt made sure to note that he believes there is a “foundation” and “good core” of guys who are doing it the right way for the Vols. He highlighted Kyle Phillips, Alexis Johnson and others among this group, but while the team has displayed tangible growth since he took over for Jones, Saturday exemplified all the weed-pulling still to be done in the program.

“We have guys in our program in 10 months that have really changed the way they think. They’ve really changed the way they go about their business every single day. They’ve worked hard. They’ve tried to do exactly what we’ve wanted them to do,” Pruitt said.

“We do have some guys on our team that are committed to the University of Tennessee and doing it the right way. They have to help us recruit, because we didn’t have enough guys out there today that wanted to do it the right way and compete and play the way they play every day.”

The Vols have five games left on their schedule, needing three wins to reach bowl eligibility. Tennessee's 2019 recruiting class ranks No. 10 nationally already, but Pruitt faces an uphill battle to get the most out of a group of guys struggling to move past the stinking residue of the Buch Jones Era.

"We’ve got what we’ve got. We’ll go out there and do the best we can with what we’ve got," Phillips said.