Tennessee football: Ranking all 25 full-time head coaches in Vols history
1916; 1919-20. 8. player. 839. Pick Analysis. 9th head coach. John R. Bender. Scouting Report
18-5-4 (10-5-3 SIAA); 1 SIAA Championship
Only a couple of coaches guided Tennessee football through more difficult times. John R. Bender coached the Vols for three years, but helping the program stay together and his accomplishments put him up here at No. 9. He’s one of the early coaches to see success on Rocky Top.
Bender came to the Vols two years after they had achieved their first real national success under Zora G. Clevenger. That generated the interest in the program to take it to another level, and Bender was expected to maintain that success.
Having played for the Nebraska Cornhuskers, Bender had already coached 11 years, leading the South Dakota State Normal (now Black Hills State Yellow Jackets), the Washington State Cougars, the Haskell Indians, the Saint Louis Billikens and the Washington State Cougars. Before joining the Vols, he spent one year with the Kansas State Wildcats.
Ironically, Bender and Clevenger were effectively a trade, as Clevenger left to take over KSU. Anyway, Bender came in and installed the short punt formation, moving away from the traditional Straight T, which was cutting edge at the time, as crazy as it seems.
It worked. The Vols went 8-0-1, only tying Kentucky at the beginning of the year. They tied Georgia Tech, who were declared national champions, to win their second SIAA Title, in three years and also beat Vanderbilt for the second time in three years.
After that season, though, just as UT was emerging, the United States got involved in World War I. They fielded no varsity teams as a result in 1917 and 1918. In 1919, the team returned, still with Bender at the helm, and went 3-3-3, but that was a rough year given the years off.
A year later, Bender went 7-2. His success laid in motion the foundation to build Shields-Watkins Field, where Tennessee football would begin play the next year, and for M.B. Banks to lead the Vols into the Southern Conference two years later. As a result, he belongs up here.