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Tennessee football: Gator Bowl loaded with Vols rejections

By Caleb Calhoun

Oct 30, 2021; Winston-Salem, North Carolina, USA; Wake Forest Demon Deacons head coach Dave Clawson looks on before the game against the Duke Blue Devils at Truist Field. Mandatory Credit: James Guillory-USA TODAY Sports
Oct 30, 2021; Winston-Salem, North Carolina, USA; Wake Forest Demon Deacons head coach Dave Clawson looks on before the game against the Duke Blue Devils at Truist Field. Mandatory Credit: James Guillory-USA TODAY Sports /
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With the Texas A&M Aggies being forced to back out of the 2021 TaxSlayer Gator Bowl, set for Dec. 31 at TIAA Bank Field in Jacksonville Fla., a new team has to be added to face the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. The leading candidate makes the 77th annual Gator Bowl really interesting for Tennessee football fans.

According to NJ.com, the Rutgers Scarlet Knights are in the best position to land the bid. Given their APR score, they reportedly earned the right of first refusal among 5-7 teams, which would mean that they get the first bid on the Gator Bowl.

If that’s the case, then this bowl game will be loaded with coaches and athletic directors Tennessee football rejected. Two of the people who would be involved in this were part of one of the most contentious rejections in UT history.

Greg Schiano is head coach of Rutgers. John Currie is the athletic director at Wake Forest. UT forced out Currie as athletic director in 2017 after only nine months on the job because of the botched coaching search to replace Butch Jones. It all started with him trying to sneak in Schiano as head coach before fan outrage resulted in both sides backing out.

Now, it looks like they’ll be on opposite sides of the Gator Bowl four years later. Ironically, though, Wake Forest head coach Dave Clawson is also connected to Currie and the man who replaced Currie as athletic director back in 2017.

Remember, Phillip Fulmer was fired as head coach in 2008 because of his disastrous offense, which was in its first season under Clawson as offensive coordinator and hadn’t figured out his schemes yet. Currie was assistant UT athletic director at the time under Mike Hamilton and had a role in Fulmer being fired.

Nearly nine years later, Currie beat out Fulmer for the athletic director job. Then, after that botched December, Fulmer launched a coup that got him to replace Currie as athletic director, and he hired Jeremy Pruitt. Both Fulmer and Pruitt are obviously gone now.

Taking all this into account, you have to wonder what Currie’s relationship is with both head coaches likely to face off against each other in this bowl game. He’s the boss of one of them and tried to hire the other one at his previous job.

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All of this makes the bowl game extremely interesting for Tennessee football fans. Clawson’s success at Wake Forest suggests he would have worked out long-term on Rocky Top, but the program was already sliding under Fulmer. Currie also deserves credit for the Tony Vitello hire in baseball while at UT. Neither is really popular in Knoxville, though.

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