When the news broke that Bruce Pearl would be retiring as Auburn basketball head coach with a little more than a month before the new campaign begins, most people jumped to one conclusion: He is running for senator. Well, as another recently retired and colorful collegiate sports figure often said, “Not so fast, my friend.”

The four-time SEC Coach of the Year revealed in his filmed retirement announcement and farewell to the program that he is staying put in Auburn and has no plans to enter the Alabama senatorial race, via Sports Illustrated's Kevin Sweeney.

“Many of you know that I thought and prayed about maybe running for United States Senate, maybe to be the next great senator from the state of Alabama,” Pearl said (around the 12:00 minute mark). “That would have required lea

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