Tennessee football has fallen in numerous games in which they were the heavy favorites. Here are the Volunteers’ 10 worst upset losses in school history.
As a storied program with a ton of history, Tennessee football has no shortage of upset losses. They come with all the great programs. Think about 2007 when the Stanford Cardinal beat the USC Trojans or when the Appalachian State Mountaineers beat the Michigan Wolverines.
Well, the Vols have had plenty of those in their time. This team has been a powerhouse throughout multiple decades and eras in college football, and all of those times they suffered a bad loss somewhere.
Sometimes, that loss cost Tennessee football something important. Other times, it was just embarrassing. And a few times it was the culmination of a bunch of bad things happening leading up to that game.
In this post, we’re going to rank the worst upset losses of all time for the Vols. All the things we mentioned above will be taken into account for them as well. So there could be a number of things that determine how big an upset is.
Yes, point spread and disparity of teams is the biggest determinant. After all, these aren’t just the 10 worst losses in the history of the program. That would be a different slideshow and have all to do with implications and how the games played out.
Here, the Vols had to be significantly better than the team that beat them. That criteria alone is the critical factor when determining an upset. We’ll then reorder them by the impact on the season and other things. However, disparity in records doesn’t always measure disparity in talent. We’ll show you what we mean by that with some of these as well.
So using all these factors, let’s get ready for a painful trip down Memory Lane for numerous fans on Rocky Top. These are the 10 worst upset losses Tennessee football has suffered in the history of the program.