Tennessee football: Remembering four previous times Vols rehired a coach
Jim Chaney is not the first time Tennessee football brought back a coach in the same capacity. Here are four other times the Volunteers rehired a coach.
It would seem very rare that a coach is rehired by a program in the same capacity. But Tennessee football actually has a bit of a history of doing just that. Whether it be coordinators or even head coaches, the Vols have not been afraid to dig into their own past to bring back coaches.
By the way, we’re not talking about any type of coach coming back. That happens all the time. Coaches are hired in different roles as they climb up the ladder all the time. This is a specific focus on coaches rehired in the exact same capacity as before.
Tennessee football has done that this year by bringing back Jim Chaney. Chaney served as the Vols’ offensive coordinator for four years from 2009 to 2012 and was part of Derek Dooley’s failed tenure, which actually resulted in him serving as an interim head coach in the final game of 2012 against the Kentucky Wildcats.
Since then, though, he has served in the same capacity with the Arkansas Razorbacks, Pittsburgh Panthers and Georgia Bulldogs. And he was never the primary blame for what happened under Dooley, as his offense broke records in 2012 with everybody healthy.
But Chaney is nothing new for the Vols. He’s the third different coordinator they’ve hired back in the same capacity over the last 30 years. In this post, we’re going to look back at all the times the Vols hired back a coordinator or a head coach.
Again, this is going to ignore people who were hired back but in different capacities. That’s why Ken Donahue, who was an assistant for the Vols in 1959 and 1960 but then became their defensive coordinator in the 1980s, won’t be counted.
Even without him, though, Chaney marks the fifth time the Vols have done this. Let’s analyze the other four. Here is a look at the previous times Tennessee football hired back a coach in the same capacity as before.