Tennessee football has consistently been ranked in the Associated Press Top 25 throughout history. The Volunteers were No. 14 in the AP all-time Top 100.
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It’s really hard to call this poll biased given the fact that it is based on an exact formula, but the Tennessee Vols appear to be ranked below where they actually belong as an all-time program in the AP all-time Top 100 poll.
The poll formula gave schools one point for number of poll appearances, one point for No. 1 rankings, and a 10 point bonus for AP National Championships.
Tennessee football came in ranked No. 14 with 568 total appearances and two AP National Championships.
Although the Vols are a Top 10 program all time in winning percentage and total wins, the lack of national championships and No. 1 rankings knocked them back.
Despite having the most appearances in the poll from 1936 to 1959 in the conference, the Vols were behind three other SEC schools: the LSU Tigers, the Florida Gators, and the Alabama Crimson Tide. They were one spot ahead of the Georgia Bulldogs and two spots ahead of the Auburn Tigers.
With Alabama No. 4, Florida No. 10, and LSU No. 11, there were two SEC schools in the Top 10 and six in the Top 16.
No. 1 on the list was the Ohio State Buckeyes, and the Oklahoma Sooners and Notre Dame Fighting Irish were ranked No. 2 and No. 3 respectively.
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Other schools ahead of Tennessee were the USC Trojans, the Nebraska Cornhuskers, the Michigan Wolverines, the Texas Longhorns, the Florida State Seminoles, the Miami Hurricanes, and the Penn State Nittany Lions.