Tennessee football: Ranking all 17 Vols conference championship teams

13. 1927

8-0-1 (5-0-1)

*Southern Conference

Robert Neyland’s first conference title team is more impressive than his second, and he was the head coach to capture both of Tennessee football’s Southern Conference Championships in school history. This team isn’t up there in terms of greatness, but it is in terms of being beloved.

At the time, the Alabama Crimson Tide were the team of the Southern Conference under head coach Wallace Wade. They had won three straight titles, and their two Rose Bowl appearances were the first step in putting southern football on the national map.

The 1927 Vols, in Neyland’s second year, played against that backdrop. And in doing so, they went 5-0-1 in the conference and shared the title with the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, who managed to go 7-0-1, and the N.C. State Wolfpack, who went 4-0-0.

It was an impressive accomplishment since it was UT’s first championship in a conference with national relevance. That national prominence set the stage for Gene McEver, who would begin playing for Neyland a year later and become the Vols’ first All-American, putting the program in the national spotlight.

UT’s only tie was to the Vanderbilt Commodores, the team Neyland was hired to beat and who had beaten him his first year, in 1926, keeping the Vols from sharing the Southern title with Alabama that year. However, this year marked a turning point in that rivalry and with the program.

We can’t put these Vols too high on the list because of the fact that they shared the title with a team that finished more games over .500 and another one that didn’t have a blemish. But it’s a significant one in school history.