Bruce Pearl fired -- life has its ups and downs

I first met Bruce Pearl in the summer of 1986. He was my seatmate on a flight from Chicago to Seoul, 14 hours and change.

Strangers become friends (or mortal enemies) in 14 hours together. But I liked Pearl. Still do. He has always known how to work a room, or an individual. I wondered how any recruits ever got away from him.  Back then, I was 28. He was 26. We were with the Iowa men's basketball party of 40 or so who traversed South Korea, China and Hong Kong for two weeks. It was Tom Davis' first Hawkeyes' team, with more talent than an Iowa team has ever had before or since.

On that flight, he told me his story. He suffered a severe knee injury as a teenager and couldn't play college basketball. He went to Boston College in his hometown and wanted to be part of the basketball team. He was even the school's eagle mascot at one point. He was Davis' liaison with the student body. He worked his way into the good graces of Davis (then BC's coach) as a student-assistant, and accompanied Davis to Stanford as a full-time assistant at a very young age.

Pearl followed Davis to Iowa in 1986 and stayed until 1992, becoming perhaps the sports' most-famous assistant coach when he blew a whistle on Illinois over its recruiting practices. There was a taped phone conversation with recruit Deon Thomas, who signed with Illinois. The subsequent NCAA investigation uncovered violations. Pearl, meanwhile, was branded a rat by many. Dick Vitale called his actions "career suicide."

It almost was. Pearl left Iowa in 1992 for the head coaching job at Division II Southern Indiana. He stayed there for nine years, won a national-title, and dismissed various D-I offers that weren't great jobs. Then he took one in 2001, at Wisconsin-Milwaukee. and his career was very much alive. He made that program something notable in his four years there, with two NCAA tourney berths.

Tennessee followed. Pearl quickly approached Volunteers omen's basketball coach Pat Summit for popularity among UT fans, which is saying something. It helped that he won a bunch of games, 145 in six seasons. Tennessee reached the Elite Eight of the NCAAs just last year with a team that probably had no business getting that far.

But on Monday, the hammer dropped. The NCAA had sent a letter to Tennessee documenting 10 major NCAA violations under Pearl's watch including an unethical conduct charge.

Funny how things change. A year ago this week, Iowa had a basketball opening. A year ago this week, Tennessee a day from playing (and beating) Ohio State in the Sweet 16 in St. Louis. I asked Pearl to let me videotape him giving his thoughts on the Iowa job. Many in Iowa wanted AD Gary Barta to at least make a play for Pearl. Here's that video:

No way in the world would Pearl have left Tennessee for Iowa at that time. Many Hawkeye fans understood that from the get-go, but some didn't. You think your school is Mecca, even when it's not. Or it's Mecca for one coach, but not another.

One, Pearl still begrudged Iowa for firing Davis, though Iowa had a different athletic director in place than the one at the time of Davis' employment at Iowa. He didn't come right out and tell me that, but that was my read on it. Two, he flat-out said the school lacked the basketball facilities of other major-college programs. That is in the process of changing, as we know. But it made me realize just how much that matters to coaches.

Most importantly, he had built Tennessee into a significant college basketball program, was 50 years old, and it didn't make sense to go anywhere else and rebuild. Especially when UT clearly wouldn't hesitate to ward off other suitors by sweetening Pearl's deal if necessary.

That was a year ago. Now, Pearl is a coach without a team. That status won't be permanent. It wasn't permanent with oodles of other coaches who have lost jobs because of NCAA violations, and it won't be with Pearl.

He can win, he can sell tickets, he can make a fan base swoon.

He can also win over players. He was hard at work on that Asia trip 25 years ago, trying to win the hearts of Iowa's players. I was interviewing Ed Horton after Iowa beat a team in Beijing and Pearl interrupted for five seconds to shout "That's exactly who you should be interviewing!" Then he left us alone.

Horton, who always tried to enhance his tough-guy persona, didn't say anything about Pearl's remark. But you could tell he liked it.

Back then, who could have imagined the highs and lows Pearl would hit in his coaching caeer. It would seem like at least some of the lows were avoidable, wouldn't it? Human beings never cease to puzzle.

Some of us go through life without severe changes in elevations, for the most part. Others go up and down, up and down. Pearl is down now. I'd be amazed if he stayed that way.