The conversation about Butch Jones should always include a tip of the cap for getting Tennessee from Point A to Point B. In recruiting and the win total, the progress he helped the Vols make is undeniable. And I’m sure those were some of the most difficult steps, in particular getting high-caliber recruits to commit to Tennessee before we had even nine wins to back it up, let alone the championships we’re still chasing.
For the fan base, the most precious commodity on the path of progress is memories. You need to make them in the moment with individual wins of significance, then you need that season to go well enough for the moment to last. And in this department, Tennessee has suffered despite the overall progress Jones has made.
The path of progress is measure a little differently from a national perspective. More removed from the emotions and less invested in the memories, it’s about getting to the big stage games and winning enough to stay in the national conversation. Butch Jones has increased Tennessee’s presence on the national stage: as we wrote before the Georgia Tech game, the Vols were in a CBS 3:30/ABC 8:00/ESPN College GameDay match-up just 12 times from 2009-14, and lost all 12. But this Saturday will mark the 13th time the Vols have played in one of those national stage games since 2015, and right now the Vols are 6-6 in them.
Tennessee has been better at getting to the big stage, yet has still struggled to stay in the conversation. How do we measure this part of UT’s progress?
We’re all looking for championships and big prizes like a New Year’s Six bowl, but that criteria alone is more limited and tends to make things a little too pass/fail. For a program like Tennessee the last 10 years, it also eliminates a step or two between where the Vols are and the endgame of an SEC or national championship. While we’d like to believe after so many years Tennessee is just one step away from college football’s top tier (or even the one below Alabama), I’m not sure those without orange-tinted glasses would agree.
What’s the simplest way to measure a team’s presence in the national conversation? I submit it’s the Top 25. Are you ranked, and for how long? The Top 25 is still what scrolls at the bottom of my television screen and the default setting on my scoreboard app. Top 25 teams play in games that get talked about every week. It’s one thing to get in the poll, something Butch Jones helped Tennessee do again. The most telling poll is the last one, and the Vols slid in there after bowl victories in each of the last two seasons. But for national relevance, I would argue longevity in the poll is more important than where you finish.
And in that department, Tennessee has struggled: not just in Butch’s first two seasons as the Vols were rebuilding, but in the last three.
Since Tennessee reappeared in the Top 25 in the 2015 preseason AP poll, the Vols have been ranked only 17 times in the last 40 polls:
- 2015: 25th preseason, 23rd vs Oklahoma, 22nd in the final poll
- 2016: Ranked in the first nine polls, 24th vs Vanderbilt, 22nd in the final poll
- 2017: 25th preseason, 25th vs Indiana State, 23rd at Florida
(Stats from Tennessee’s media guide and poll history at Wikipedia)
In eight of Tennessee’s 17 appearances since 2015, the Vols have been ranked between 22-25.
Again, this is clearly progress: the Vols were ranked 18th in the 2008 preseason poll, lost to UCLA, and disappeared from the Top 25 for four years. They were back for one week – #23 against Florida in 2012 – then gone again for the rest of that season and all of the next two. That’s two appearances in seven years. Butch Jones has 17 in three years.
But three seasons removed from getting back to the poll, an inability to stay there has impeded further progress and kept Tennessee out of the national conversation beyond those first nine weeks of 2016. Even after the Vols were ready for the big stage – and that 2015 team definitely was – I feel like we’ve spent just as much time since then discussing whether Jones was the guy as we have the Vols as a contender.
One step of progress beyond winning the SEC East for whoever is coaching this team next year and beyond: getting and staying ranked throughout the season. Historically speaking, it’s been something the Vols were capable of even in years they didn’t bring home a title.
When Johnny Majors replaced Bill Battle in 1977, the Vols hadn’t been ranked since October 1975. The Vols would appear four times in the 1979 poll, then not again until the magical 1985 SEC Championship season. That year Tennessee entered the poll at #16 after beating #1 Auburn and finished #4.
The Vols were ranked in the first two polls of 1986, then every week in a 10-2-1 1987 season. The 1988 Vols started 18th before an 0-6 start chased them out. Then Tennessee’s “decade” of dominance began in 1989, where the Vols entered the poll at #17 after a win at #6 UCLA in week two. From there, the Vols were a mainstay in the polls and the national conversation for almost two decades:
- The Vols were ranked in every poll from the third week of 1989 through the end of September 1994, when a 1-3 start after Jerry Colquitt’s knee injury gave way to Peyton Manning as the starter. From late September 1989 through the end of the 1991 season, the Vols were in the Top 15 every week en route to a pair of SEC titles.
- After sliding in the final poll in 1994 at #24, the Vols were ranked every week from 1995 through mid-October 2000 after a 2-3 start. From October 1995 through the end of the 1999 season the Vols were in the Top 10 every week except one, dropping to #12 after the 1996 loss to Memphis.
- Back in the poll by the end of the 2000 season, the Vols spent all of 2001 in the Top 11 and were ranked until early November 2002. Then the Vols were ranked every week in 2003 and 2004, spending all but one of those weeks in the Top 20.
- The Vols were ranked until late October 2005, every week in 2006, and all but one week in 2007.
You can see a decline if you look at the number of weeks spent in the Top 10, etc., but overall the Vols were still right there throughout Fulmer’s tenure. Tennessee hasn’t been in the Top 5 beyond the Florida game since 2001, but was in the Top 10 in November of 2003, 2004, and 2006, where you can convince yourself you’re still in the hunt for the big prize.
Whoever is coaching Tennessee next year will likely inherit a team with work to do to get back in the poll. But the good work Butch Jones and his staff have already done in recruiting make that a much more manageable hill to climb. If we get in the business of a coaching search, we’ll all be looking for the guy who can help us win a national championship again. But there are still a few steps between here and there, and getting the Vols back in the Top 25 on a regular basis will be one of the most important and most telling between a rebuild and the title.