Former Auburn defensive coordinator Kevin Steele has agreed a deal to join the Tennessee football coaching team, sources told ESPN.
Steele, 62, has been Auburn’s defensive coordinator for the past five seasons, but has not been retained by Auburn’s new coach Bryan Harsin, who has hired former Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason as its defensive coordinator.
Steele, a finalist for the Broyles Award as a top assistant coach in college football in the 2017 season, has deep ties in Tennessee. He played in Tennessee and began his coaching career in Tennessee, both under Johnny Majors. Steele was a finalist for Vols’ head coach in 2018, when Jeremy Pruitt was hired. Steele and Pruitt worked with Nick Saban’s staff in Alabama.
While at Auburn, Steele’s defenses finished in the top 20 nationally in scoring four of his five seasons in the Plains. He is considered one of the best recruiters in the country and has worked for some of the biggest names in college football, including Bobby Bowden, Tom Osborne, Dabo Swinney, Les Miles and Saban. Steele also worked in the NFL as a linebacker for the Carolina Panthers from 1995 to 1998.
“He’s an outstanding coach and as strong as anyone I’ve ever seen in recruiting,” Bowden told ESPN.
Auburn owes Steele a little more than $ 5 million from the contract he signed last January, which at the time made him the highest paid defensive coordinator in college football.
Steele returns to the alma mater amid an internal investigation into alleged misconduct in the Tennessee football program, which has been running since November. The university announced last month that it has retained the services of Michael Glazier and Kyle Skillman at the law firm Bond, Schoeneck & King to help review what the university said in a statement as “regulatory issues that have been our brought to the notice ”.
ESPN reported last week that Tennessee did not extend the contracts of assistant football coaches and suspended the hiring of coaches for vacancies, while Vols continued to investigate whether violations of the program occurred.