Tennessee Athletic Department Coaches Comment on Criticism of University

Head coaches at the University of Tennessee held a joint press conference Tuesday morning to discuss criticism of the athletic department at a time when the school has received a lot of backlash.  

Football coach Butch Jones summed up the entire conversation by stating the coaches wouldn't stick around if they felt there were major issues, per Wes Rucker of 247Sports: "If we didn't like what was going on here, we wouldn't be here. And we're here."

Alas, there was one person who was notably absent from the proceedings: athletic director Dave Hart, which Patrick Brown of the Times Free Press pointed out:

However, Dustin Dopirak of the Knoxville News Sentinel shed light on Hart's absence: 

The effort to do some damage control on the university's image comes after a month of new and renewed allegations. The Tennessean (h/t Joe Rodgers of Omnisport, via the Sporting News) reported six women filed a federal lawsuit against the school for creating "a culture that enables sexual assaults."

Also, the month has brought the focus back toward a 1996 incident involving former Volunteers quarterback Peyton Manning and a female trainer. T.J. Quinn of ESPN's Outside the Lines reported the trainer contacted the sexual assault crisis center about the situation.

Women's basketball coach Holly Warlick downplayed the idea that Tennessee is not a welcoming place for females, as noted by Dopirak: "To think the university is treating women unfairly is totally untrue."

She added: "If I had a daughter, I wouldn't hesitate to have her here at Tennessee. This is a special place," per Rucker.

Men's basketball coach Rick Barnes, who's in his first year with the Vols after stints with several other schools, including Texas, praised the athletic department as a whole, per Sara Mitchell of WVLT: "The University of Tennessee athletic department is as good as I've ever seen."

Jones also discussed the alleged victims and how the overall situation should be handled moving forward, as relayed by Dopirak.

"Everything is about the alleged victims. We feel for them," Jones said. "We hurt for them. It starts there first and foremost."

But Dopirak noted the football coach is also concerned about the overall impact: "Our competitors are using (the culture perception) against us."

Ultimately, the Tennessee coaches decided to hold the press conference in an attempt to limit the damage on the athletic department by talking about their own experiences after a difficult month.

It's still unclear what type of lasting impact the allegations will have against the school. But the coaches tried to express that whatever problems may have existed previously are no longer prominent.