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Tennessee football: Five reasons for excitement over Vols hiring Jay Graham

By Caleb Calhoun

14 Oct 1995: Tailback Jay Graham of the Tennessee Volunteers runs with the football during a game against the Alabama Crimson Tide at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama. Tennessee won the game 41-14. Mandatory Credit: Craig Jones /Allsport
14 Oct 1995: Tailback Jay Graham of the Tennessee Volunteers runs with the football during a game against the Alabama Crimson Tide at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama. Tennessee won the game 41-14. Mandatory Credit: Craig Jones /Allsport /
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Photo by Todd Bennett/GettyImages
Photo by Todd Bennett/GettyImages /

5. Connection to great offensive coaches

We can honestly say this guy learned from the best. People may not realize this, but Jay Graham has worked under numerous legendary coaches throughout his career. As part of Tennessee football’s program, he played for a Hall of Fame coach in Phillip Fulmer, who is obviously now UT’s athletic director, in the 1990s and then coached under him in 2005 as a graduate assistant.

But after Fulmer, Graham eventually joined the South Carolina Gamecocks, and he coached under Steve Spurrier for three years. Spurrier is arguably on the Mt. Rushmore of SEC head coaches, and he’s an offensive genius in his own right. Graham left Spurrier for the Vols for a year, but then he went to the Florida State Seminoles and Texas A&M Aggies.

During the past seven years with those schools, he has worked under Jimbo Fisher, another offensive genius who coached a Heisman Trophy winner in 2013 and has coached two No. 1 draft picks at quarterback. That’s a pretty impressive accomplishment, and it means Graham has coached under three head coaches who won national championships.

Oh, and speaking of quarterbacks, Graham also played for David Cutcliffe, another great offensive mind. Simply put, his tenure under Hall of Fame and future Hall of Fame head coaches all involve people whose strength was on the offensive side. Since he’ll be coaching running backs, that’s exactly  the side where he needs to have the connections. It makes him a perfect fit for the role.

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