Tennessee football: Ranking all head coaches of Vols 2019 opponents

Shawn Elliott has two connections to the previous coaches on this list. He served as interim coach of the South Carolina Gamecocks in 2015 after Steve Spurrier retired, and he then spent one year as an assistant to Will Muschamp before taking the Georgia State Panthers job. Meanwhile, Chattanooga Mocs head coach Rusty Wright had spent the last two years under Elliott at GSU.

This year, entering his third year as head coach of the Panthers, we don’t know what to make of Elliott. He went 7-5 his first year, a dramatic improvement over the 3-9 team he inherited, but then stumbled to 2-10 in 2018. Combine that with his 1-5 record as S.C.’s interim coach, and he’s 9-15 overall.

However, we’re giving him somewhat the benefit of the doubt. South Carolina was 2-4 when he took over and had the more brutal part of their schedule coming. Meanwhile, last year, he had to replace everybody at GSU. So this is his first year with his players and some experience.

All we really have to go on outside of that is his 7-5 record in 2017, which he achieved with players who went 3-9 the year before. That and his SEC experience could make him a dangerous coach for Tennessee football to face. He’s 0-1 against the Vols, but he did almost beat them with the Gamecocks in 2015. So UT can’t take him lightly.