3-4-2 (0-2 SIAA)
Welcome to the first head coach on this list who’s fourth year was with Tennessee football. Like Josh Heupel, his fourth year was his first year with the Vols. A halfback with the Indiana Hoosiers from 1900 to 1903, Clevenger had spent three years with the Nebraska Wesleyan Prairie Wolves. He went 1-2, 0-3-1 and 1-5 in those three years.
With that horrendous resume, it’s hard to understand how he got hired by the Vols. However, he was the basketball and baseball coach at the time too, so he had a resume beyond football, which probably helped him to a degree. It didn’t help him on the gridiron his first year, though.
The Vols were coming off a 3-5-1 season under head coach Lex Stone in his only year, which was one year after they went 1-6-2 in George LeVene’s third year. As a result, they were still down as a program, and Clevenger wasn’t going to fix that his first year.
UT’s only wins were over Mooney School, the Maryville Scots and the Rhodes Lynx. A year later, though, Clevenger showed improvement, going 4-4. Then the Vols went 6-3 in 1913, and in 1914, they won their first ever title and beat the Vanderbilt Commodores for the first time ever, going 9-0 and winning the SIAA. Clevenger’s fourth year and his first at UT started it all.