In June, UT will have to prove that Kiffin violated rules despite proper guidance from UT administration, Buckner said. Because the Notice of Allegations already indicates that Kiffin knowingly broke rules laid out for him by Blackburn, football appears to be in good shape at UT.

"The committee has gone out of its way to tell institutions that you can't just monitor a program, you have to be proactively or actively monitoring that program," Buckner said. "That's what Tennessee is going to have to respond to the NCAA committee."