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Tennessee Football: Verne Lundquist Retirement Gives Vols One More Year to End His Curse Over Them

By Caleb Calhoun

Mar 26, 2015; Syracuse, NY, USA; CBS announcer Verne Lundquist during practice for the semifinals of the midwest regional of the 2015 NCAA Tournament at Carrier Dome. Mandatory Credit: Mark Konezny-USA TODAY Sports
Mar 26, 2015; Syracuse, NY, USA; CBS announcer Verne Lundquist during practice for the semifinals of the midwest regional of the 2015 NCAA Tournament at Carrier Dome. Mandatory Credit: Mark Konezny-USA TODAY Sports /
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Tennessee football has been cursed since Verne Lundquist entered the booth for the SEC game of the week in 2000. The Vols now have one year left to end it.

Going into the 2000 season, the Tennessee Volunteers were two years removed from a national championship. Sure, they had under-achieved in 1999 after starting the year No. 2 and finishing 9-3, and the year was also supposed to be a rebuilding year.

But overall, the program was on a high note. The year started with a home victory over the Southern Miss Golden Eagles to move the Vols into the Top 10.

Two weeks later, with College Gameday in Knoxville, they played their first game as the Home Depot’s SEC on CBS Game of the Week in the format we know it: with Verne Lundquist as the play-by-play commentator in the booth.

That game went down as one of the most infamous games in Tennessee football history, as Jabar Gaffney dropped a pass that would be ruled a touchdown catch to give the Florida Gators an undeserved 27-23 victory.

Little did the Vols know that they would be condemned to more than 15 years of being cursed with Lundquist in the SEC booth.

With Lundquist calling the game on CBS, Tennessee is 10-28. They are 0-3 in SEC Championship games, which first moved to CBS when he began calling SEC games on the channel as well.

This record includes the Florida loss in 2000, a 15-game losing streak in front of him from the end of Phillip Fulmer’s tenure to just last year, and the worst loss in school history: a 31-20 SEC Championship loss to the severely less talented LSU Tigers in 2001 with a chance to go to the national championship game.

Simply put, the Vols have been cursed ever since Verne Lundquist began calling games on CBS. They have their worst loss in school history, lost 15 games in front of him, and have 0 SEC or national championships with him in the SEC on CBS booth along with only one Top 10 finish.

Sure, there have been some legendary wins, in 2001 when the Vols beat Alabama for a seventh straight time and when they scored their most historic road win ever over the Florida Gators, in 2003 when they knocked off the Tide again in five overtimes, and in 2004 when they led another huge upset over the Georgia Bulldogs on the road.

But by and large, the program has been cursed with him in the booth.

Now, it has been confirmed that Lundquist will leave the booth at the end of the 2016 season. This gives the Vols one last year to end the curse, and there’s only one way they can break it: by winning an SEC Championship.

They don’t have to win a national title, and they are not going to get to a winning record with him in attendance. But they can get that SEC Championship.

And perhaps this is an omen that they will finally get it.

To be fair, before we close, none of this is indicative of Lundquist the broadcaster. Despite what some have said, I have always enjoyed his commentary, and both color guys who worked with him, Todd Blackledge and Gary Danielson, are great commentators.

So he deserves lots of credit, and while he presided over Vols failures, he also presided over the most successful period in SEC football history. Tennessee just happened to not be a part of that.

But the Vols have one more chance to send off Lundquist well. This season is it.

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