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Tennessee football: Ranking every Vols team in 2010s decade

By Caleb Calhoun

ATHENS, GA - OCTOBER 1: Jauan Jennings #15 of the Tennessee Volunteers rides the shoulders of Gavin Bryant #36 after making the game winning catch against the Georgia Bulldogs at Sanford Stadium on October 1, 2016 in Athens, Georgia. (Photo by Scott Cunningham/Getty Images)
ATHENS, GA - OCTOBER 1: Jauan Jennings #15 of the Tennessee Volunteers rides the shoulders of Gavin Bryant #36 after making the game winning catch against the Georgia Bulldogs at Sanford Stadium on October 1, 2016 in Athens, Georgia. (Photo by Scott Cunningham/Getty Images) /
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Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images /

9. 2011

5-7 (1-7)

*No postseason

Entering his second year, Derek Dooley’s first team went 6-7 and had the promise of a bright future. However, the attrition of three head coaches in three years still lingered. A depleted roster due to Lane Kiffin’s bust of a recruiting class and Kiffin’s gutting of former Phillip Fulmer players also hurt things. Then the NCAA investigation hurt Tennessee football’s recruiting class.

As bad as all of this was, the Vols were set to play the toughest schedule in history too. Their draw from the SEC West that year just happened to be the teams who would become the three best in the country: The Alabama Crimson Tide, LSU Tigers and Kentucky Wildcats. All this led Dooley to say this was more like Year One and 2010 was like Year Zero.

Anyway, UT opened the season 2-0 with blowout wins over the Montana Grizzlies and the eventual Big East Champion Cincinnati Bearcats, who were ironically led by Butch Jones. However, at the Florida Gators, Justin Hunter, their go-to receiver, went down on a non-contact injury early. That set them back as they lost 33-23.

Two games later, after beating the Buffalo Bulls, starting quarterback Tyler Bray went down against the Georgia Bulldogs, and the Vols lost 20-12. So a depleted roster that just lost its two best weapons on offense was about to enter a brutal stretch.

It wasn’t pretty. Blowout losses to Alabama, LSU and Arkansas along with a 14-3 loss to one of Steve Spurrier’s best South Carolina Gamecocks teams were all part of this. Sure, there was a win over the MTSU Blue Raiders, but overall, it was ugly. After an overtime win over the Vanderbilt Commodores to get to 5-6, the bottom finally fell out.

Dooley, given what he was up against, admitted later that he consistently made excuses for his young talent to keep them motivated to play. And the lack of standard he set finally had its impact at the 4-7 Kentucky Wildcats. With Joker Phillips running a receiver at quarterback, Tennessee football lost to them for the first time since 1984. It was a 10-7 embarrassment.

The result was no bowl game for Rocky Top. And it also set in motion a chain reaction of events that would lead to the Vols having another bad recruiting class and a historically bad defense the next year, which we go to next.

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