Tennessee football’s five worst seasons with third-year coach

Not many people no about Zora G. Clevenger, but he was the first head coach who truly turned Tennessee football into a winner. Clevenger coached UT from 1911 to 1915 and led the Vols to their first ever conference championship and their first win over the Vanderbilt Commodores when they went 9-0 and won the SIAA in 2014.

That reset the expectations for the program, which led them to shoot for the stars when they hired assistant Robert Neyland. However, before Clevenger got to that point, he spent three years laying the foundation. In 1911 and 1912, he had back to back .500 years. That made for four straight seasons without a winning record for the Vols.

Then came this year. Clevenger showed marked improvement by going 6-3. However, that is still one of the five worst seasons by a third-year head coach. It shows you how successful such coaches on Rocky Top have been.

The Vols got off to a 5-1 start, only losing to the Sewanee Tigers. However, they then lost a 7-6 heartbreaker to Vanderbilt again, making it seemed like they were cursed against the program, and then they lost 6-0 to the Alabama Crimson Tide before beating the Kentucky Wildcats to close things out.

So Rocky Top lost to three rivals to finish 6-3. But that set the stage for an epic arrival in 2014. Starting with this year, the Vols wouldn’t go four straight seasons without a winning record until exactly 100 years later.