So one thing about Pruitt

[BanditVol]

The team was clearly much better motivated against BYU and gave much better effort.  Pruitt figured it out.  So why did it take a loss to Georgia State to inspire him to do such a basic thing? 

What irritates me is that since I live in bammer, I am constantly subjected to Saban  on TV pretty much 24x7.  Saban can't comment on an upcoming game without...and I mean constantly, building them up, and saying his team should not take them for granted. Most recently he was praising NM State's passing offense and saying his players needed to be ready.

How, the HELL, did Pruitt work with Saban so long and not have some of that rub off on him?  Unreal.   We sucked mightily against Charleston last year also, and I think there is a trend that Pruitt doesn't take the lighter opponents all that seriously.  But he should, if he learned anything from Saban.  I'm not exaggerating with Saban to say that about half his pregame remarks are on how his team needs to take the next opponent seriously and be ready for them.  Pruitt apparently wasn't listening much in his time in bammer-land.   

Having said that, maybe he learned his lesson and the team will be motivated from now on.

It's something I will look for Saturday...how hard will this team play against Chattanooga.  If they don't come out really pissed off and administer an ass whooping, then I may join the crowd that has already given up on Pruitt.

[Tnphil]

I listened to his Monday presser the week of the Ga State game and he built Ga State up to be the 85 Bears...He talked about their athletes and how their QB was going to be hard to handle etc.. So he did do that part right. But IMO they treated that more as a scrimmage game where they were going to play dang near everybody and use it as a teaching type situation. There was no fire from the coaches or players because of the approach and as the game went on and by the time they realized they were in a fight it was too late...The Bama's, the OSU's, the UGA's etc..etc.. have the ability to flip that switch and say enough is enough and turn it around...with our youth and inexperience and lack of a quality QB we don't have the ability to 'Flip That Switch' and it bit us in the azz....Pruitt learned a hard lesson.

I worked under a head coach back in the 80's and early 90's that when we were playing teams that week that we knew we would beat by 30 he would practice the team that week like we were 14 point underdogs.....We would hit harder those weeks and practice harder those weeks than the weeks we were playing teams our equal or even better than than we were....In other words he got their attention. He said if you approached those lesser teams with a ho hum attitude as coaches your team would take that ho hum attitude. Against Ga State we had that ho hum attitude.

[Creek Walker]

I listened to his Monday presser the week of the Ga State game and he built Ga State up to be the 85 Bears...He talked about their athletes and how their QB was going to be hard to handle etc.. So he did do that part right. But IMO they treated that more as a scrimmage game where they were going to play dang near everybody and use it as a teaching type situation. There was no fire from the coaches or players because of the approach and as the game went on and by the time they realized they were in a fight it was too late...The Bama's, the OSU's, the UGA's etc..etc.. have the ability to flip that switch and say enough is enough and turn it around...with our youth and inexperience and lack of a quality QB we don't have the ability to 'Flip That Switch' and it bit us in the azz....Pruitt learned a hard lesson.

I worked under a head coach back in the 80's and early 90's that when we were playing teams that week that we knew we would beat by 30 he would practice the team that week like we were 14 point underdogs.....We would hit harder those weeks and practice harder those weeks than the weeks we were playing teams our equal or even better than than we were....In other words he got their attention. He said if you approached those lesser teams with a ho hum attitude as coaches your team would take that ho hum attitude. Against Ga State we have that ho hum attitude.

One thing about the BYU game: the OL rotation was only trimmed by one, but substitutions were less frequent. Those guys were given an opportunity to find a rhythm with one another. And it worked...OL play was much improved. Also, play-calling seemed less like an experiment and more like a gameplan to win the game. If Pruitt and his staff approached the GaState game the same way they approached the BYU game, Tennessee would've won by 3 touchdowns. I know Pruitt is relatively new to this role as a head coach, but there's a ton of coaching experience on that staff...a ton of championship-level coaching experience. It's mind-boggling.

[Tnphil]

One thing about the BYU game: the OL rotation was only trimmed by one, but substitutions were less frequent. Those guys were given an opportunity to find a rhythm with one another. And it worked...OL play was much improved. Also, play-calling seemed less like an experiment and more like a gameplan to win the game. If Pruitt and his staff approached the GaState game the same way they approached the BYU game, Tennessee would've won by 3 touchdowns. I know Pruitt is relatively new to this role as a head coach, but there's a ton of coaching experience on that staff...a ton of championship-level coaching experience. It's mind-boggling.

Agree 100%

[BanditVol]

One thing about the BYU game: the OL rotation was only trimmed by one, but substitutions were less frequent. Those guys were given an opportunity to find a rhythm with one another. And it worked...OL play was much improved. Also, play-calling seemed less like an experiment and more like a gameplan to win the game. If Pruitt and his staff approached the GaState game the same way they approached the BYU game, Tennessee would've won by 3 touchdowns. I know Pruitt is relatively new to this role as a head coach, but there's a ton of coaching experience on that staff...a ton of championship-level coaching experience. It's mind-boggling.

Yep 

[VinnieVOL]

One thing about the BYU game: the OL rotation was only trimmed by one, but substitutions were less frequent. Those guys were given an opportunity to find a rhythm with one another. And it worked...OL play was much improved. Also, play-calling seemed less like an experiment and more like a gameplan to win the game. If Pruitt and his staff approached the GaState game the same way they approached the BYU game, Tennessee would've won by 3 touchdowns. I know Pruitt is relatively new to this role as a head coach, but there's a ton of coaching experience on that staff...a ton of championship-level coaching experience. It's mind-boggling.

Agree with that.

[BanditVol]

One more nuance on this....today I watched a lot of SECN, and saw coach after coach building up their (cupcake) opponents for this weekend.  So with Saban I'm not talking about the typical coach speak about the other team, but how he goes on to emphasize repeatedly that his team had better be ready, doesn't matter who the opponent is.

And it's that aspect that Pruitt was missing, obviously, against Georgia State. I am sure he talked them up at his presser.  He apparently just forgot to talk them up to his team.     Hopefully he never makes that mistake again.