Tennessee football: Michigan State beat Michigan with people Vols lost or passed on

It was arguably the game of the year. The undefeated Michigan State Spartans came back from down 30-14 in the second half to beat the Michigan Wolverines 37-33 and enter the College Football Playoff race. They can thank Tennessee football for being in this situation.

Every storyline involving Saturday’s win for MSU comes back to people connected to the Vols. Let’s just start with Mel Tucker. Back in December of 2017, when Tucker was defensive coordinator of the Georgia Bulldogs, Phillip Fulmer was down to him and Jeremy Pruitt as head coach of the program. Fulmer picked Pruitt.

Now, Tucker is 8-0 at Michigan State and 2-0 against Jim Harbaugh. Tennessee football went 16-19 with two losing seasons in three years under Pruitt and then had to fire him because of an NCAA investigation that is still ongoing.

Simply put, the Vols missed out on Tucker in a big way. However, thanks to Pruitt’s firing and the investigation, they suffered a wave of transfers. Among those transfers were both starting linebackers, Henry To’o To’o and Quavaris Crouch.

To’o To’o went to the Alabama Crimson Tide. Crouch, however, went to Michigan State. In Saturday’s win over Michigan, he led the team in total tackles with 13 and solo tackles with seven, and he also had a pass deflection.

Finally, the player of the game was Kenneth Walker III, who entered the Heisman race with 23 carries for 197 yards and five touchdowns and 208 total yards from scrimmage. Walker just happens to be from Arlington, Tenn., just outside of Memphis.

In 2019, Walker was a two-star on Rivals and a three-star on 247Sports and ESPN. Tennessee football did not offer him a scholarship. He went to the Wake Forest Demon Deacons, where he played for two years before transferring to Michigan State. With four games left, Walker already has 175 carries for 1,194 yards (6.8 yards per carry) and 14 touchdowns.

There is plenty of blame to go around for these events, but ultimately, Fulmer is the most responsible. He is the one who decided to hire Pruitt over Tucker. The other two events that happened stem from that. Pruitt is the one who passed up on Walker, and his firing led to Crouch leaving for Michigan State.

You could maybe say Crouch never would’ve landed at UT if the Vols didn’t hire Pruitt. However, he was clearly willing to play for Tucker. That combined with the school obviously being a place of interest for him means he likely still would have landed on Rocky Top.

As a result, what happened on Saturday was just a clear reminder of what Tennessee football lost and passed up. Dabo Swinney initially built the Clemson Tigers into a powerhouse by accepting people UT pushed away like Tajh Boyd. Could Michigan State be doing the same thing now? It’s definitely possible.