College basketball has been hit with a huge coaching retirement decision for a second straight preseason. Auburn’s Bruce Pearl is leaving the profession, sources told CBS Sports on Monday. The news comes less than a year after Virginia’s Tony Bennett shockingly stepped away in October 2024.
After an offseason of considering whether or not to retire, Pearl came to terms with his decision and made it final on Monday morning, sources said. He’s been linked to a potential Senate run in Alabama in recent months as well, but sources had been downplaying the likelihood that Pearl would go into politics this year.
The 65-year-old Pearl has been a head coach dating back to 1992, when he first got a chance running a program at Division II Southern Indiana where, in 1995, he won a Division II national championship. Pearl then coached at Milwaukee from 2001-05, at Tennessee from 2005-11 and, since 2014, has guided Auburn under its greatest run in school history. Pearl leaves on a high note, having taken the Tigers to the Final Four with a No. 1 seed last season. He also took Auburn to its first Final Four in 2019.
Pearl’s path to Auburn was clouded in controversy. He received a three-year show-cause penalty in 2011 as his unprecedented run of success at Tennessee came to an end after an investigation found he lied to NCAA investigators about the program’s impermissible contact with prospects. It was the second time Pearl was wrapped up in an NCAA investigation, along with the Deon Thomas recruiting scandal in the late 1980s.
At the time, Auburn was mired in apathy. The program had posted just one winning record in SEC play from 2001-17. After sitting on the sidelines due to NCAA punishment, Pearl needed a job and Auburn needed hope. He turned Auburn from an SEC doormat into a championship-level program. Pearl’s teams were excellent at defending the rim, annually ranking near the top of the country in block percentage. He recruited the transfer portal at an extremely high level, helping bigs like Walker Kessler and Johni Broome turn into the best versions of themselves. Pearl also elevated Auburn into a new zip code on the recruiting trail. The top 11 players that Auburn has landed in the internet era were all recruited by Pearl.
Now, Auburn shifts into a new era. Steven Pearl, Bruce’s son, is being promoted to full-time head coach, sources said. Steven Pearl is 38.
Each Auburn player will have a 30-day window to enter the transfer portal due to the coaching change. The Tigers lost all but one rotation member from last year’s Final Four club, but Auburn still has a talent-laden roster, headlined by lone returner Tahaad Pettiford. The sophomore lefty is slated to be one of the SEC’s top guards. Auburn also has ballyhooed transfer forwards in KeShawn Murphy (from Mississippi State) and Keyshawn Hall (from UCF), who would have serious markets if they choose to hit free agency.
This breaking news story will update shortly.
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