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Tennessee football: Ranking Vols last 10 seasons with first-year coordinator

By Caleb Calhoun

14 OCT 1995: TENNESSEE LINEMAN BUBBA MILLER #71 CELEBRATES WITH WIDE RECEIVERS MARCUS NASH #12 AND JOEY KENT #11 FOLLOWING A TOUCHDOWN DURING THE VOLUNTEERS 41-14 VICTORY OVER THE ALABAMA CRIMSON TIDE AT LEGION FIELD IN BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA. Mandatory Cr
14 OCT 1995: TENNESSEE LINEMAN BUBBA MILLER #71 CELEBRATES WITH WIDE RECEIVERS MARCUS NASH #12 AND JOEY KENT #11 FOLLOWING A TOUCHDOWN DURING THE VOLUNTEERS 41-14 VICTORY OVER THE ALABAMA CRIMSON TIDE AT LEGION FIELD IN BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA. Mandatory Cr /
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Photo by John Sommers II/Getty Images /

9. 1977

4-7 (1-5)

Joe Avezzano (OC) and Bobby Roper (DC)

The worst season in Tennessee football history before 2017 was 40 years prior, and it was the beginning of an extremely long rebuild to bring the Vols into the modern era. Johnny Majors came home this season and had to give fans a dose of reality in terms of how far behind the rest of the SEC the program was.

Majors led UT to an SEC title in 1956, and in 1976 he won a national title after four years with the Pittsburgh Panthers. So it was a huge deal that he was coming home. The problem was, as he replaced Bill Battle, he was taking over a program with massively outdated facilities and had been entrenched in playing an old-school style.

So the first move for Majors was to install more NFL-friendly schemes, which included a vertical passing game on offense. Still, the program was in such bad shape that he probably couldn’t bring any high-profile names.

With two unproven hires at offensive and defensive coordinator, his first season with the Vols was the school’s first seven-loss season ever. As we said, it was UT’s worst season on Rocky Top before 2017 came along. And it would be a long time before Majors got the program where he needed it to be.

The whole thing was a disaster, but offensive coordinator Joe Avezzano did become a head coach after three years there. He went to the Oregon State Beavers. Meanwhile, defensive coordinator Buddy Roper was gone after just two years on the job.

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