I never thought I would ever say this but I might be okay with bringing Phil back to stabilize the program.
Give him a year to year contract with no buy out. Make sure he knows his job is to stabilize the program and then retire in a few years. Go out and hire a great OC and DC. Re-establish recruiting after the mess Fooley left behind. Get the program back to a stable point and then in 3 years or so you can re-assess. If Phil is knocking it out of the park you can give him a real contract and go from there. If he has just brought back some stability, you can promote one of your coordinators to the HC job if they show promise or hire a good coach from a position of stability.
In the interim, you need to replace both the AD and chancellor of the university with people that at least understand the true mission of UTK. The true mission of the school is not to be a top 25 research university - it is to educate the citizens of the state. This helps provide the citizens of the state with job opportunities and benefits the state by attracting business to the state. The athletic department is a reflection of our university. When it does well, it attracts money that helps to fuel the academic mission of the university. When athletics does well, it is also attracts interest in the university by high school students. People want to be associated with a winner.
Academics and athletics are NOT mutually exclusive. I would argue that at a school like UTK, academics and athletics are mutually inclusive - it is difficult to have one without the other.
