Tennessee Football: Vols’ Last Game vs Texas A&M Seems Like a Generation Ago

Tennessee football last played the Texas A&M Aggies in the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 1, 2005. But that seems like a lifetime ago for the Volunteers.

Remember the state of Tennessee football the last time they faced the Texas A&M Aggies? Nobody could have predicted the 12 years that would follow.

The Vols entered the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 1, 2005, with a 9-3 record. However, two of their losses were to the undefeated Auburn Tigers, and a third was to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, a weird one at home in which Erik Ainge went down with a season-ending injury.

Still, Tennessee entered the Cotton Bowl in high spirits after winning the SEC East with far and away the youngest team in the conference. Fans loved this Tennessee team because of what they had dealt with up to that point.

On the other side, the Aggies were in their second year under head coach Dennis Franchione. Remember him? He was the Alabama coach for two years before bolting for College Station.

The game was in Dallas, so it was basically a home affair for A&M. Texas Governor Rick Perry, an A&M graduate, came out for the honorary coin toss. And in blatant disrespect, he shook the Aggies’ hands afterward while intentionally turning his back on the Vols.

Tennessee was also a three-point underdog.

But the oddsmakers looked pretty stupid early on.

Tennessee built a 14-0 first quarter lead thanks to an Aggies turnover and two touchdown passes from Rick Clausen.

More Texas A&M mistakes combined with dominant Tennessee passing extended the lead to 28-0 at halftime, and Clausen had three touchdowns. He finished the game 18 of 27 with 222 yards and no interceptions on top of those touchdowns.

In the second half, Tennessee went to the ground game, and the co-starters that year, Gerald Riggs Jr. and Cedric Houston, finished the game with a combined 164 yards. Both had a touchdown as well.

By the end of the third quarter, Tennessee had a 38-0 lead. The Vols finished the game with a 38-7 victory and a 10-3 record.

It’s crazy to think about now, but that was a peak time for the program. This game was significant because of where Tennessee would be that summer…and what would follow afterward.

Let’s first talk about why the Vols spent the summer on such highs of highs after that dominating win. We already mentioned their youth and Ainge’s injury.

Well, Ainge’s injury is just part of the quarterback story for the Vols that year. They had two freshman quarterbacks in Ainge and Brent Schaeffer, and Phillip Fulmer and Randy Sanders made the gutsy decision at the start of the season to go with them. However, both went down with injuries. That’s when Fulmer had to call on Rick Clausen the final three games of the year.

After the Notre Dame loss, he helped the Vols win the East. Then they played their hearts out against Auburn in the SEC Championship game. That became significant for the program in the down the road. We’ll get to that.

But the appreciation for the 2004 Vols went back to the summer of 2004. Tennessee had finished 10-3 in 2003 and lost senior quarterback Casey Clausen to graduation.

That year, the Vols were considered a program on the decline and expected to go through a rebuilding phase. Then, turmoil struck.

Fulmer skipped SEC Media Days because it was in Alabama, and the recent revelations of his dealings with the NCAA to put the Crimson Tide on probation could have resulted in his subpoena if he set foot in Alabama.

The move combined with the decision to start two freshman quarterbacks rejuvenated Vols fans.

Then came the season. Tennessee beat the Florida Gators off of a 50-yard field goal by James Wilhoit just after he had missed a game-tying extra point on the previous drive.

After losing to Auburn in the regular season, they then went to Athens and shocked a No. 3 ranked Georgia Bulldogs team and seniors David Greene and David Pollack as double-digit underdogs.

Then they beat Alabama, securing a 3-0 record against their main rivals that year. Of course, that’s what won them the East.

After the Cotton Bowl victory, with everybody expected to come back, the Vols spent the whole offseason riding high.

Expectations shot up for 2005, and Tennessee began the season ranked No. 3 in the country. However, the quarterback injuries the previous year became significant.

Fulmer and Sanders were forced to give Clausen a chance at the starting job after how strongly he finished the season. However, Ainge was clearly the future of the program. The move shot Ainge’s confidence, and he had an awful spring and Fall Camp.

Meanwhile, Clausen just lacked in talent. That move derailed the Vols for the year. Tennessee’s inability to get consistent play at quarterback made for one of the worst offenses in school history.

Then, Fulmer spent so much time promoting his program in the summer that he lost control of the players’ conduct. The Vols had 21 arrests that offseason. These two things destroyed the offense overall.

You know the story after that. Tennessee wasted a great year on defense with atrocious offensive play and finished the year 5-6. Three years later, Tennessee fired Fulmer and began a dramatic downturn for the worst.

Simply put, 2005 started a decade of futility for Tennessee football that Vols fans thought they’d never see.

But just before that fall, Tennessee’s last victory was a Cotton Bowl victory over the Texas A&M Aggies. It would be the last bowl game in their 16-year streak of making the postseason. And it would be the last time that a losing record was foreign to Vols fans.

Of course, the Aggies were in a different place then too. They were playing an old-school Southwest style of football in the Big 12 under Franchione. And the program fired him three years later.

Then they had four mediocre years under Mike Sherman as he tried to bring a pro-style with Ryan Tannehill at quarterback.

And of course, their game with Tennessee was eight years before they’d move to the SEC, where Kevin Sumlin and Johnny Manziel would take the conference by storm.

It’s crazy to look back and think about where Tennessee and Texas A&M were the last time they met. It was only 12 years ago, but it seems like a lifetime.