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KNOXVILLE -- Tennessee athletic director Mike Hamilton makes it common practice to include clauses in coaches' contracts offering performance bonuses for winning coach of the year awards.

New football coach Lane Kiffin had a better idea of how to use that money.

"He came back to us and said, 'I don't want that. I want that to be split among the staff,'" Hamilton said of Kiffin, who was introduced Monday. "He understands that his staff will have a great deal to do with his success."

Especially if everything goes according to Kiffin's plan.

Hamilton said he has agreed to spend "significantly more" on Kiffin's assistants than he did for the previous staff under coach Phillip Fulmer.

A potentially star-studded staff ultimately could include Kiffin's father, Monte, a longtime NFL defensive coordinator. Kiffin named his brother-in-law, former South Carolina quarterbacks coach and recruiting coordinator David Reaves, as his only assistant already in place.

Kiffin asked for patience on making the rest of his hires.

"I know all of you want to see this done today and everybody in place, and all of the Internet boards will be happy and everything. That's not the way it's going to be," Kiffin said in his press conference at the Wolf-Kaplan Center inside Neyland Stadium.

"We have to do this right. Mike and the entire athletic department have made a great contribution to make sure this happens. They've done a great job from the first day we met talking about the staff we want to put together for us to be able to win. We're going to do that, but it's going to take time. When it's all said and done, you'll be extremely happy with the staff that comes here."

Kiffin will retain four holdovers from Fulmer's staff -- offensive line coach Greg Adkins, running backs coach Stan Drayton, tight ends coach Jason Michael and wide receivers coach Latrell Scott -- to help with recruiting during the transition.

He plans to use that time to evaluate those coaches while he interviews other potential candidates.

Kiffin, the former Oakland Raiders coach, informed offensive coordinator Dave Clawson and Fulmer's entire defensive staff Sunday night that they would be replaced.

"I don't have guys lined up in their spots right now, so I am interviewing them in this process," Kiffin said of the current offensive assistants. "So they're going on the road recruiting with us. I'm going to give them a great opportunity to have the job.

"I'll interview other guys for their jobs as well, and we'll come out with the best staff that we can come out with."

In this case, Hamilton said, that's an exciting possibility.

"He had a plan for who he wanted every one of the position coaches to be," Hamilton said of Kiffin. "I know he's also got secondary plans, so now he'll try to go out and hire that first wave. We've given him a very aggressive budget pool to do that."