That's not much solace. There were 18 years between that scandal and last night, and Baylor showed progress along the way (they had made multiple Elite Eights and Sweet Sixteens). Their trajectory from the bottom to the top was not straight up, but each low was higher than the previous one.
Tennessee football is still stuck in this stage of making marginal, incremental progress (like winning 8-9 games), then having the bottom fall out and hitting a new low (going 4-8, losing to Georgia St, going 3-7 and getting into NCAA trouble, etc.). We aren't anywhere close to building something like they have.