This Saturday marks the second game Tennessee football has ever played under Jeremy Pruitt after a bye week. Don’t forget the first one for the Volunteers.
As they get set to host the Georgia Bulldogs as heavy underdogs with a 1-3 record and no wins over an FBS school, Tennessee football has a tiny bit of precedent for games after a bye week under Jeremy Pruitt. And for once, this is good news surrounding the Vols.
Saturday will be the second game ever under Pruitt that the Vols play the week after a bye. Just like the first one, they enter the game with a losing record and facing a ranked team. But in their first outing, they pulled off a huge upset.
Last year, after losing at the Georgia Bulldogs of all people, Tennessee football was 2-3 with three blowout losses to Georgia, the Florida Gators and the West Virginia Mountaineers. They entered their bye week looking to be in a lost season.
Coming out of it, they were set to visit a 4-2 Auburn Tigers team who was ranked No. 21 in the nation. Auburn jumped out to a 7-0 lead, but the Vols did not go away. They hung tough through the first half, and then they took the lead in the second half only to hold on for a 30-24 victory, the signature upset win of Pruitt’s first year.
Despite finishing the year 5-7, that win showed that Tennessee football appeared to have something special building under Pruitt. He was super-prepared after the bye, dialing up the perfect blitz packages to force Auburn turnovers that delivered them the win, and the offense figured out exactly where to exploit the Tigers’ weaknesses defensively.
That game showed just how good Pruitt can be when he has two weeks to prepare. It also was Jarrett Guarantano’s coming out party. He was criticized early on last year just like he’s been this year, but he had over 300 yards and threw for two touchdown passes in that game.
Now, Pruitt has to do the same thing if he wants another upset for the Vols this week with Georgia coming to town. Once again, his back is against the wall, and once again, nobody is believing in his program. Can he pull it off again?
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The circumstances are different this time. For one thing, Auburn had just lost to the Mississippi State Bulldogs and appeared to be reeling under Gus Malzahn. Georgia, meanwhile, is coming off a bye themselves, is undefeated, and beat the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, a top 10 team, the last time they were on the field.
On the other side, Tennessee football looked much better last year heading into that game. Sure, they were 2-3 with all three losses by 26 points. But all three of them were to Power Five schools, and they at least had one FBS win, at home over the UTEP Miners.
This year, they are 1-3, and their only game against a Power Five team was two weeks ago, a 34-3 loss to the Florida Gators. Meanwhile, they have lost to two Group of Five programs on the year. So things are looking much worse for them and much better for their opponent heading into Saturday’s showdown.
However, this one is at home. And the point of the post is to say a look to the past shows that Jeremy Pruitt truly does know how to deliver victories after a bye week. If those adjustments come through Saturday, maybe the Vols could pull off a historic victory.