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10 Worst Bowl Losses in Tennessee Football History

By Caleb Calhoun

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Aug 16, 2014; Houston, TX, USA; General view of the exterior of NRG Stadium (left) and Houston Astrodome before the NFL game between the Atlanta Falcons against the Houston Texans. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

8. 1979 Bluebonnet Bowl: Tennessee Loses to Purdue Boilermakers 27-22

This is another football game that is disheartening because of the way the Tennessee Vols had lost more than anything else.

Johnny Majors had finally gotten the Vols to a bowl game in 1979 after a rough two-year rebuilding process in which he had inherited a mess from Bill Battle. At 7-4, they were set to face the Purdue Boilermakers in the Bluebonnet Bowl.

The program was very much in a similar state to where it’s at now with Butch Jones in his third year leading an 8-4 Tennessee team up against a Big Ten team in a bowl game. Just like then, the Vols were unranked, but their opponent was ranked in the Top 15, giving them a huge opportunity if they won.

Purdue was ranked No. 12 at the time. And in an up-and-down season for Tennessee that included a win against Notre Dame and a loss against Rutgers, this was an up and down game. The Vols fell down to the Boilermakers 21-0.

But the fun had not even started.

Majors’s team displayed serious mental toughness and fought its way back to take a 22-21 lead late in the game. But Purdue scored in the final minute to win 27-22. The Vols had fought back and taken all the momentum only to let it slip away at the most crucial time, ending any chance for a big victory to close the season and further setting back the momentum Majors was building.

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