As you’d expect against an FCS foe, the Vols’ national stat rankings improved quite a bit this week. Here’s a closer look.

Offense

Climbed out of the Bottom 30: Nothing was in the Bottom 30 last week

Climbed into the Top 30: Red zone offense, tackles for loss allowed

Fell to the Bottom 30: 4th down conversion percentage

Fell out of the Top 30: Nothing this week (because nothing was in the Top 30 last week!)

Nearly everything is better on offense, with the exception of the passing game.

Defense

Climbed out of the Bottom 30: Scoring defense, which went from 112th to 55th. Woo for shutouts against FCS opponents.

Climbed into the Top 30: Team passing efficiency defense, passing yards allowed, and red zone defense. Also, passes intercepted, when compared to the most recent ranking in 2018.

Fell to the Bottom 30: Nothing, although 3rd down conversion percentage defense remains there even with a slight improvement.

Fell out of the Top 30: Nothing, technically, although sacks fell dramatically from just out of the Top 30 all the way to 79th.

Most everything is improving, with the exception of sacks and tackles for loss. Third down is still a problem.

Special Teams

Special teams is currently the strength of the team by a long shot. The worst ranking here is No. 30, in kickoff returns. Net punting is one spot away from being the legit best in the nation.

Turnovers and Penalties

Five turnovers this week against the Mocs shook things up here, with turnovers gained teleporting straight from the cellar (No. 105) to the penthouse (No. 20), turnover margin going from No. 113 to No. 32, and the others seeing vast improvement. Regarding penalties, the number of them improved, but the actual penalty yards took a bit of a hit.

The Vols beat an FCS team 45-0 this past Saturday, which doesn’t really mean much with the SEC slate looming. But they beat an FCS team 45-0 this past Saturday, which means they did what they were supposed to do.

The first two weeks of the season, the Vols didn’t do what they were supposed to do, so living up to expectations is an improvement. Does it mean we can circle back to the preseason expectations we had for this team for the remaining games of the season? Probably not. Not yet, anyway. But it does mean that we can probably adjust them upward just a wee bit from where they were last week.

We learned more about some of the Vols’ future opponents this weekend, too. Alabama and Georgia were about what we expected. Kentucky and South Carolina perhaps better than expected. And Florida and Mississippi State look perhaps a little less intimidating today than they did this time last week.

Bottom line, I’m adjusting my expectations for the Vols upward just a bit, and I’m shuffling and readjusting some of the remaining opponents.

With those adjustments, I now have an expected win total of . . . 3.65. Woo. A good showing against the Gators will do wonders for these numbers.

• Preseason: 6.55
• After Week 0: 6.6
• After Week 1: 2.87
• After Week 2: 2.37
• After Week 3: 3.65

Details: I have Alabama and Georgia at 5%. In my second tier, I have Florida and South Carolina both at 25%, and in my third tier, I have both Kentucky and Missouri at 30%. Mississippi State and Vanderbilt are inching toward tossups, but aren’t there yet, as I have them both at 40%. I have UAB at 65%.

The GRT Expected Win Total Machine

Here’s a table with my expectations this week:

Tennessee Volunteers currently

Current record: 1-2 (0-0), 3rd in the SEC East

The Vols’ past opponents

Georgia State Panthers

Current record: 2-1 (0-0), 1st in the Sun Belt East

So much for the “Maybe these guys are better than we think” talk.

BYU Cougars

Current record: 2-1 (0-0)

But wait, maybe these guys are, in fact, better than we thought. Beating a ranked team has to count for something, right?

Chattanooga Mocs

Current record: 1-2 (0-0), 4th in the Southern Conference

The Vols’ future opponents

Florida Gators

Current record: 3-0 (1-0), 1st in the SEC East

Kentucky had this game won, at least twice. They looked like the better team most of the game until they lost the lead late. And then they still had a chance to hit the go-ahead field goal with about a minute remaining. This was in character for Kentucky and in character for Florida, which I hate to say because if we see an in-character game between Tennessee and Florida this weekend, we’re in for another new and novel heartbreak. The Vols need to break character.

Also, Gators quarterback Feleipe Franks left the game on a cart with an air cast and is expected to miss the rest of the season. But it was backup QB Kyle Trask who won that game for Florida. We might have preferred to see Franks.

Bottom line, Kentucky looks better than I thought, but Florida looks worse than I thought.

Georgia Bulldogs

Current record: 3-0 (1-0), 1st in the SEC East

Ho-hum. Nothing to see here.

Mississippi State Bulldogs

Current record: 2-1 (0-0), 3rd in the SEC West

The video recap of this one suggests that Mississippi State is dangerous, both to others and to itself. They pulled their starting quarterback after a couple of picks and gave up a 100-yard kickoff return right after finally getting a go-ahead touchdown. Chalk this one up more to mistakes than overall aptitude.

Alabama Crimson Tide

Current record: 3-0 (1-0), 1st in the SEC West

Forget the final score here for a second. The Gamecocks made this look like a real contest for much of the game, sometimes looking like world-beaters themselves and sometimes making Alabama look vulnerable. Yeah, Bama ultimately did what Bama ultimately does, so there’s not much change in attitude about them, but South Carolina looks better than I thought they would, especially after losing Jake Bentley.

South Carolina Gamecocks

Current record: 1-2 (0-1), 5th in the SEC East

See above.

UAB Blazers

Current record: 2-0 (0-0), 1st in C-USA West

Off this week.

Kentucky Wildcats

Current record: 2-1 (0-1), 5th in the SEC East

See the bit on Florida above. The Kentucky-Florida game was much closer than the score suggested. The Wildcats really should have won and looked like the better team most of the night. Something clicked off when Kyle Trask took over for Florida.

Missouri Tigers

Current record: 2-1 (0-0), 3rd in the SEC East

Rushing touchdown. Receiving touchdown. Both a punt return and a kickoff for a touchdown. Defense pitched a shutout. Fine day, even considering the opposition.

Vanderbilt Commodores

Current record: 0-2 (0-1), 5th in the SEC East

The Commodores were off this week.

What about you? Where are your expectations for the Vols now?

Looking to give the system a hard reboot, Tennessee quarterback Jarrett Guarantano dropped back, wound up, and launched a deep ball to one of his most trusted receivers.

It should have been intercepted.

An ominous start against an inferior opponent, to say the least.

Forget the fact that Ty Chandler opened the game with an impressive 58-yard kickoff return. We Vols fans have seen too many happy moments immediately swallowed by malevolent forces not to be vulnerable to the oh noes. So, that near-pick on the first play from scrimmage made you grimace and brace for another day of new and novel disappointment.

But it was thankfully short-lived because immediately after that, the machine finally came to life. Tim Jordan ran for 9 yards, Eric Gray for another 8, and then Jordan for another 4. Then Chandler got another first down on a 7-yard run and hit the checkerboards on the next play with a 13-yard dash to the end zone. Five plays, all on the ground, for a 41-yard touchdown drive aided by Chandler’s kickoff return to set up the short field position.

With the exception of an early live-fire experiment for backup quarterback Brian Maurer in the third possession, the Vols offense scored on every drive until the third quarter was nearly over, and with Tennessee leading 45-0 by that time, the game was over as well.

Meanwhile, the defense not only pitched a shutout, it went on a turnover binge. Nigel Warrior returned an interception 22 yards on Chattanooga’s first offensive possession. After forcing a three-and-out on the second, the Vols defense let the Mocs drive down to within sniffing distance of the end zone but recovered a fumble to end that threat. The defense got off the field early after another three-and-out on another possession and then ended the next one with the first of two interceptions by Jeremy Banks.

By the end of the day, the Tennessee defense held Chattanooga to 227 total yards and caused five turnovers despite playing half the game with its second- and third-string. The Vols offense ran for 195 yards and threw for 165 and protected the ball the entire game. And the special teams even got into the action, blocking a punt and returning it for a touchdown.

Guarantano went 7-8 for 142 yards and 3 touchdowns in his short day. Six different running backs put up more than 10 yards, Chandler leading the way with 46. And eight different guys caught passes with three of them — Jauan Jennings, Marquez Callaway, and Cedric Tillman — getting in the end zone.

All of this, of course, was accomplished against an outmatched team from an entirely different league. But we don’t have to go too far back in the archives to find disappointing results against inferior opponents, so it was good to hear the machine hum again.

It’s not like we weren’t all wondering if it was all a pile of rubble already, especially after Guarantano’s first pass looked more like the last two weeks than how he looked last year.

But the awful beginning gave way to finally seeing what we actually expected.

Who know? Perhaps the season itself can follow the same script.

It’s Gameday on Rocky Top, with the Vols looking to forget the last two weeks and reboot the season right here and right now. Here’s the Gameday Gameplan for Vols fans. Where and when to find the Vols game on TV, what other games to watch today as well, and what to listen to and read as you wait for kickoff.

When is the Vols game, and what TV channel is it on?

Here are the particulars for today’s Tennessee game:

• Kickoff: 12:00
• TV: SECN
• Official video streaming: Watch ESPN
• Official audio streaming: Vol Network
• Live stats

The best other games for Vols fans to watch today

Here’s our list of games to watch today, curated just for Vols fans:

And here’s a searchable version of the entire college football TV schedule for this week:

GRT games and contests

While you’re waiting for the games to begin, make sure that you submit your answers to the GRT Guessing Game questions and update your picks for the GRT Pick ‘Em.

GRT game-week audio

The podcasts this week were preempted by Zofran, Pepto Bismal, and Sprite, but you can find Will’s regular Friday appearance with Josh Ward and Heather Harrington on WNML’s Sports 180 here.

Pre-game prep

To catch up on your pre-game reading, have a look at our game preview posts from earlier this week:

• Progress, Competitiveness, and Investment
• What the SPM comps say about Tennessee-Chattanooga
• Video: Post-GYU, Pre-Chatt pressers, interviews, and more
• What Do We Make of Pruitt and Fourth Down?
• Tennessee Vols statistical ranking trends – after BYU
• What is the GRT Expected Win Total Machine telling you after BYU?
• Embrace/Refrain

Go Vols!

Two weeks ago today, we talked about how progress was the expectation, and how much would be the fun part. More important than the difference between 6-6 and 7-5 would be how the team performed play-for-play a year after losing six games by four-plus possessions. Preseason projections from SP+ had the Vols within two possessions of every opponent except Alabama; FPI had the Vols within one possession of every opponent except the Tide.

The last two weeks have changed the conversation considerably. Even if the Vols fought their way back to 5-7 – which feels like an accomplishment from here, as our expected win totals this week are hovering around 3.45 – there is, of course, an actual difference between 5-7 and 6-6. Coming that close to bowl eligibility at the end of November would make us re-live the pain of the BYU loss.

Progress may be best measured now not in the distance to the top, but the distance from the bottom. That being the case, there’s an even more compelling argument to focus on what this team does on every snap…because there is still plenty of opportunity to be far more competitive this season.

In that department, you’re going to want to believe in FPI more than SP+. Tennessee’s projected margin of victory after this week:

	SP+	FPI
at Florida	-21.6	-14.8
Georgia	-23.4	-14.7
Mississippi St	-11.8	-6
at Alabama	Shut your eyes!	Don’t look at it!
South Carolina	-5	-4.9
UAB	18.6	20.1
at Kentucky	-7.6	-6.2
at Missouri	-14.7	-8.6
Vanderbilt	6.9	7.8

Both models have the Vols favored only against UAB and Vanderbilt after this Saturday, where Tennessee’s line is about where it opened against Georgia State. FPI’s current projection has in part become SP+’s preseason projection: two-score losses to Florida and Georgia, a third squeaking by with Missouri at -8.6, but generally competitive in every other non-Alabama game.

Obviously, a 4-8 season isn’t going to be viewed as an overall success. It’s hard to re-calibrate expectations after a huge upset; it would’ve been interesting to see how the 2016 Vols were received if they beat Vanderbilt to earn a Sugar Bowl bid at 9-3, but still gave away the SEC East after losing to the Gamecocks at -14.5.

Still, week to week what this team (and its fans) need is the idea that Tennessee can compete. We’ll learn a lot about that against Florida. With a win against Chattanooga, the Vols can technically still carry the bowl eligibility conversation to the South Carolina game, with any win before then incredibly helpful. Between now and then, if the Vols can be relatively competitive with Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi State, it will not only be an important sign of progress, it will keep more fans in Neyland Stadium and invested wherever we find ourselves.

The last two weeks are a great reminder that we never know exactly what’s going to happen week to week. It’s a really tough road to six wins now. But the kind of progress that keeps people invested is still available. We’ll see what signs of life show up against Chattanooga.