Here's the unpleasant thing about revoking wins from Pruitt's second and third year (8 in 2019, 3 in 2020). Have a look at the all-time wins list for major college football:
1.Michigan - 983
2.Alabama - 949
3.Ohio State - 949
4.Notre Dame - 933
5.Texas - 933
6.Oklahoma - 932
7.Penn State - 915
8.Nebraska - 911
9.Tennessee - 863
10.USC - 862
11.Georgia - 860
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12.LSU - 829
13.Auburn - 791
14.Clemson - 786
15.West Virginia - 772
16.Texas A&M - 769
17.Virginia Tech - 765
18.Washington - 755
19.Pittsburgh - 753
20.Florida - 752
I took the liberty of inserting a dashed line at the spot Tennessee would occupy with 11 vacated wins (from 863 down to 852).
You'll notice two things about that new spot:
-- It takes us out of the Top 10 all-time programs.
-- It drops us behind UGa.
So yeah, this is painful. I don't care if those were "Beldar wins." I don't care if some of them came in the weird Covid season.
I do care about our place in the history books.
Josh Heupel can, with several years of concerted effort, climb us slowly back up that ladder above UGa. We'll have to make up 8 games on them. So it won't come quick or easy. But we can do that.
I'd just rather not have to. I'd much rather still be climbing our way up to pass Nebraska.
So yeah, let's don't pretend that vacating a couple of seasons of wins from the Pruitt era doesn't hurt the program. It does.
Go Vols!