Tennessee Vols butt of no more jokes and playoff-bound revived by Josh Heupel

Updated Dec. 13, 2024 5:55 a.m. ET

Associated Press

A turnover trashcan foreshadowed a coaching search best described as a dumpster fire that wound up costing both a coach and athletic director their jobs. A revolving door to the coaching office. NCAA investigations and scholarship reductions.

Don't forget the mustard bottle thrown onto the Neyland Stadium field or the golf ball that came perilously close to Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin — whose one-year stint made him the first of seven coaches, counting two interims, at Tennessee after Philip Fulmer's firing after the 2008 season.

No. 6 Ohio State is very accustomed to the playoff stage with the Buckeyes chasing their first national championship since 2014 and first title game berth since 2020. Seventh-ranked Tennessee has its own championship pedigree, though its last national title came in 1998. The Volunteers had been the butt of too many jokes for too many painful years.

That officially ends Dec. 21 when ninth-seeded Tennessee visits No. 8 seed Ohio State (10-2, No. 6 CFP) in the first round of the newly expanded College Football Playoff with the winner traveling to the Rose Bowl to face top-ranked Oregon.

“We’ve done our job and gotten this place back to back to where it needs to be and where it’s supposed to be," said center Cooper Mays, who played high school ball in Knoxville and knows what this game means. "We’re out here in the in the thick of things going into December, going into the playoffs. And that’s kind of all you can ask for at this point in the season.”

Plenty of credit goes to coach Josh Heupel who has the Vols (10-2, No. 9 CFP) here in his fourth season on Rocky Top.

A quick revival for a program that went 3-7 in 2020 with a season capped by the chancellor firing then-coach Jeremy Pruitt and nine others over what she called “shocking” NCAA violations. Tennessee took its medicine to ease NCAA sanctions by cutting scholarships, leaving Heupel with 65 his first season. University officials refused to self-impose a bowl ban on top of that.

That probe ended in the summer of 2023 with the NCAA's scathing report detailing more than 200 infractions — including 18 Level I violations and approximately $60,000 paid out to athletes and families in recruiting infractions under Pruitt.

Yet Heupel, who called potential NCAA punishment a “mere speed bump” when hired in January 2021, has managed something none of his recent predecessors could. He has led Tennessee to 30 victories since 2022 — matching the Vols' winningest three-year stretch since 1998 through 2000.

To Heupel, the playoffs is simply the next step.

“You earn the right to be in a game like this,” Heupel said. "Proud of what we’ve done throughout the course of the regular season. The new season starts here. There was an expectation inside of our program to earn the right to play in a game like this in the postseason. So, a lot of excitement in here but also understand we’re getting ready to go play a great team and we’ve got to be at our best.”

Heupel initially was seen as a quick fix. New athletic director Danny White, who was lured away from Central Florida to rebuild the athletic program, brought Heupel with him to Knoxville a week after his own hiring.

Now Heupel is the third coach in Tennessee history with multiple 10-win regular seasons with two in three years. He joins Fulmer (five in 17 years) and Gen. Robert Neyland (five in 21 including the 1951 national championship season). Neyland Stadium is full again. The waiting list for season tickets now tops 20,000, even with an announced ticket hike for 2025 to help the Vols pay and keep top talent.

“Vol Nation proves again why y’all are the best fan base in all of sports!” White wrote on social media Wednesday night.

When the NCAA came at Tennessee again over name, image and likeness compensation to athletes, the same chancellor who made sure everyone cooperated in the last investigation didn't hold back. Donde Plowman called the NCAA a “failing” organization in a letter in January pursuing “factually untrue and procedurally flawed” allegations.

She had the backing of the attorneys general of both Tennessee and Virginia who sued the NCAA, and a federal judge granted their injunction request in February keeping the organization from enforcing NIL rules for recruits.

The winning has been contagious at Tennessee:

— Coach Rick Barnes won the regular season Southeastern Conference men's basketball title in March and now has the nation's top-ranked team.

— Coach Tony Vitello won the Vols' first national baseball title in June.

— New Lady Vols coach Kim Caldwell has the women's basketball team back in the AP Top 25 after White fired Kellie Harper, who won national titles for the late Pat Summitt as her point guard.

Yet, football really just means more in the SEC. Those devoted Vols' fans, who stopped the hiring of then-Ohio State defensive coordinator Greg Schiano before Tennessee could even announce a news conference in 2017, had hoped Tennessee would host a game. Road losses to Arkansas and Georgia are why Tennessee is hitting the road.

This game seemed a distant hope for Tennessee after too many beatdowns by Alabama, Georgia and Florida — and yes even Vanderbilt. Not to Heupel, who was the quarterback who led Oklahoma to the 2000 national championship.

And not for Tennessee, not now. ___

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