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Tennessee football: 5 reasons Vols are fine without top 10 recruiting class

By Caleb Calhoun

KNOXVILLE, TN - SEPTEMBER 15: A view of the outside of Neyland Stadium before a game between the Florida Gators and Tennessee Volunteers on September 15, 2012 in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by John Sommers II/Getty Images)
KNOXVILLE, TN - SEPTEMBER 15: A view of the outside of Neyland Stadium before a game between the Florida Gators and Tennessee Volunteers on September 15, 2012 in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by John Sommers II/Getty Images) /
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Photo by John Sommers II/Getty Images
Photo by John Sommers II/Getty Images /

1. Tennessee football’s history is better with non-top 10 classes.

Here’s a bit of fun for you. Phillip Fulmer only had one recruiting class throughout the 1990s that many services were willing to put outside of the top 10. That one class just happened to be the 1995 class.

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In case you’re not clear on your history, that happens to be the winningest class in the modern era of Tennessee football. Producing guys like Al Wilson, Peerless Price and Leonard Little as a junior college transfer, four-year players from 1995 went 45-5 and with a national championship and two SEC Championships, never failing to win 10 games or finish outside of the top 10.

Throughout the 2000s, meanwhile, the Vols have had top 10 classes progressively become huge busts. Fulmer’s 2002 class was a top 5 class, as was his 2005 class. The four-year players in each unit progressively got worse for having the worst four-year stretch of any player since 1989. And it got uglier with the top 5 class of 2007.

Then there were the Lane Kiffin and Derek Dooley classes. These back to back top 10 classes resulted in four straight losing seasons from 2010 to 2013, the longest stretch in school history. But it gets better.

In 2014 and 2015, Butch Jones produced two straight top 5 classes. They were juniors and seniors in 2017, and that just happened to be the worst year in Tennessee football history. See a pattern here for the Vols? Meanwhile, the class to produce the most NFL Draft picks this decade was the 2013 class, and was a class outside of the top 20 while producing three draft picks.

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If history is any indication, it’s almost better when the Vols don’t get top 10 classes. Too many of their players turn into busts, while non-top 10 classes work out better. Maybe the No. 12 class is exactly what they need. You assume Jeremy Pruitt will evaluate talent better than previous coaches, but this just shows that history is on Tennessee football’s side without a top 10 class.

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