I also think it's important not to lose sight of just how resilient this bunch has been. I, like many others, gave up on the staff (but not the team!) after the UF game, and I was clearly wrong. It wasn't that we had lost to OU and UF, it was how it happened...devastating gut punches where we gave it away to teams I thought we were better than. I believed Jones and company were stubborn and would refuse to make the changes we needed to make, but they proved that my concerns were unfounded. It would have been easy, and expected in the years before Butch got here, to fold after the Arkansas game and pack it in.
They didn't do that. Down 24-3 against Georgia they battled back and found a way to win, which was desperately needed. They went on the road against a top-10 Alabama team, and even while the Vols played two true freshmen on the OL and with some key injuries throughout, they played hard and our staff arguably outcoached Saban's bunch. Yes, we lost, and that's ultimately what matters, but it was clear that the team believed they could and would win, and they played like they knew it. They played like they weren't afraid of Alabama, and that's certainly improvement given that the Tide have been the class of college football for the better part of the last decade.
Then, last night, again some bad breaks early. No panic, no flinching; the Vols kept going to work and were rewarded with a blowout victory.
The culture change between this team and, say, the 2011 team is night and freaking day. I was wrong about Butch Jones and the other coaches. I don't know if they'll get us to a national title or an SEC title, but damn does it feel good to see a team that fights and competes, week in and week out, no matter what. That is going to pay off in big, big ways.