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Tennessee football: Ranking all 10 Vols coordinator changes this decade

By Caleb Calhoun

STARKVILLE, MS - OCTOBER 13: Tennessee Volunteers defensive coordinator Sal Sunseri coaches on the sideline in place of head coach Derek Dooley, who is coaching from the booth after hip surgery, in a game against the Mississippi State Bulldogs on October 13, 2012 at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville, Mississippi. (Photo by Butch Dill/Getty Images)
STARKVILLE, MS - OCTOBER 13: Tennessee Volunteers defensive coordinator Sal Sunseri coaches on the sideline in place of head coach Derek Dooley, who is coaching from the booth after hip surgery, in a game against the Mississippi State Bulldogs on October 13, 2012 at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville, Mississippi. (Photo by Butch Dill/Getty Images) /
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Photo by Butch Dill/Getty Images
Photo by Butch Dill/Getty Images /

10. Sal Sunseri

Role: Defensive Coordinator

Hired by: Derek Dooley

Year hired: 2012

Coach replaced: Justin Wilcox

Of all the mistakes Derek Dooley made, this is the move that ended up getting him fired. We first have to look at what led to this. After a 5-7 season and a loss to the Kentucky Wildcats in Dooley’s second year, 2011, new athletic director Dave Hart publicly criticized the coaching staff and was firm about not renewing contracts.

Knowing the situation, seven guys jumped ship, and the most notable loss was Justin Wilcox. So Dooley went to find a replacement and would’ve settled on Kevin Steele had Steele not allowed 70 points in a bowl game, a fluke game that was just a mental lapse for an otherwise very good defensive coordinator.

Without much support from Hart, Dooley couldn’t shoot as high as he wanted, so he had to settle on Alabama Crimson Tide linebackers coach Sal Sunseri. Sunseri had no coordinator experience and was only familiar with the 3-4 defense.

So he came to Knoxville to install that 3-4 defense, and it became a disaster. Tennessee football wasted one of its historically best offensive years behind Tyler Bray, Justin Hunter, Cordarrelle Patterson and Mychal Rivera with a historically bad defense.

They put up 44 points against the Georgia Bulldogs, 31 against the Mississippi State Bulldogs, 35 against the South Carolina Gamecocks and 48 against the Missouri Tigers and lost all of those games. A fourth-quarter collapse cost them against the Florida Gators as well. If the Vols keep Wilcox or hire Steele, they likely go 10-2 in 2012. Instead, they went 5-7, and Dooley was fired. It was clearly the worst coordinator hire of the decade.

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