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

6. 1979

7-5 (3-3)

Frank Emanuel (DC)

Johnny Majors had a bunch of random defensive coordinators his early year with Tennessee football, and 1979 was a totally random one. That season, he hired a former player for UT in Frank Emanuel to lead the defense.

This was the first of three years Emanuel would spend as an assistant for the Vols, but 1979 was the only season in which he served as defensive coordinator. To be fair to him, though, despite no experience in that role, it was the best of Majors’s first four seasons on Rocky Top.

After the worst season in school history in 1977 and a 5-5-1 season in 1978, Majors finally showed flashes of hope with his program in 1979. The only problem was how inconsistent it was that year.

Still, the Vols went 7-5 and made their first bowl game in five years, losing to the Purdue Boilermakers 27-22. And to be fair to Emanuel, the defense gave up only 13 points in one loss, to the Rutgers Scarlet Knights.

Standing out his one year, though, was a superb defensive performance against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. They were No. 13 at the time heading to Knoxville, and UT dominated them 40-18. Emanuel’s defense set the tone.

One year later, Majors overhauled his staff as offensive coordinator Joe Avezzano left, so he brought in Bill Pace to run the offense, and he replaced Emanuel as defensive coordinator with Bobby Jackson. Both had prior experience, but the result was a second losing season and third non-winning season in four years.