Tennessee top 10 program of all time

#3
#3
LakeMaryFLVol said:
For the young fans .Friendly reminder.

The 50 Best College Football Programs, Ranked by Total Wins
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Not that it matters much but pre 1970 some of these teams schedule were not what you would say P5 power type teams. Penn State (independent) played a light schedule and focused on a few marquee games. Notre Dame always plays the military schools and figures 5 sure wins a year. Clemson got a lot of their wins when ACC was a terrible FB conference. Miami and FSU came in and dominated for a decade or more until the others finally caught up with them. ACC has been mostly 4th or 5th of P5 until recently. Now Clemson is just about above all teams in that conference by a good measure
Virgina Tech was in Southern Conference and Independent , then joined a weak ACC in 1977.
I guess Michigan Ohio State & USC will get no W's in 2020.
 
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#5
#5
LakeMaryFLVol said:
For the young fans .Friendly reminder.

The 50 Best College Football Programs, Ranked by Total Wins
Click to expand...

Absolutely. And don't forget it.

Everything runs in cycles. The fans in this generation (don't know a better way to say it) don't remember when Alabama and Clemson both were really pitiful. That was about the same time LSU was not much better. Ohio St couldn't buy a win over Michigan.

So, UT has been down (understatement, I know). But everything runs in cycles. We're about to cycle up.

Can I get an amen up in here?

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#8
#8
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#9
#9
I've been arguing this with the LSU side of my family the past few weeks. Historically, no doubt, but as soon as Phil stepped in at AD, we became a top 10ish program today and on the rise from there
 
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#10
#10
preacherwebb said:
Interesting ... Clemson was no where to be found. Imagine that. That's what I was saying earlier, about the current generation doesn't know that UT was, and is one of the best programs ever, while Clemson had a year or two back in the 80's, but up until the last 5-10 years, was nothing special.
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Found the right coach finally. I want to believe we’ve done the same.
 
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#11
#11
Florida is one of the more successful programs since 1964 (Spurrier's arrival on campus) and especially since 1990, however they rank 20th. Maybe a bit surprising to some, but it just shows how absolutely dreadful they were as a program before the 1960's. They might have been the worst team in the SEC up to that point.
 
#12
#12
preacherwebb said:
Interesting ... Clemson was no where to be found. Imagine that. That's what I was saying earlier, about the current generation doesn't know that UT was, and is one of the best programs ever, while Clemson had a year or two back in the 80's, but up until the last 5-10 years, was nothing special.
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every single program has had ebbs and flows. What goes around, comes back around.
 
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#15
#15
esarmstrong said:
Florida is one of the more successful programs since 1964 (Spurrier's arrival on campus) and especially since 1990, however they rank 20th. Maybe a bit surprising to some, but it just shows how absolutely dreadful they were as a program before the 1960's. They might have been the worst team in the SEC up to that point.
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Key words " before the 1960s..."

Something pretty important happened in our country around that time that changed everything. Especially Sports!
 
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#18
#18
peaygolf said:
every single program has had ebbs and flows. What goes around, comes back around.
Click to expand...
This has been the longest drought of woefulness and mediocrity compared to any other tradition rich blue blood team who has gone thru a rough stretch. None of them have stayed down for as long and been as bad as we have for nearly 15 years now. Bama and Texas and USC were not down as long as we have been. I compare our struggles to Nebraska and LSU in the 90’s they were just awful. And yea they haven’t won’t a national title since 1980 but Georgia has been a model of consistency for the last 25 years nearly only one losing season since 1996. I think this decade is going to be much better though for us.
 
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#19
#19
Why do people say we've been down for 15 years?

I think the real down years started in 2010 when we got Dooley.

Fulmer had two bad year's in 05 and 08.

06 and 07 we're both good. Kiffins team was good. Took Bammer to the wire. Shoulda won.

We were still fine then, it's when Kiffin rode off into the darkness that put us in the Dark Ages. Or when we decided to hire Derek Dooley.

It's really only been the last decade that has been so poor.

It's not that different from Bammers bad decade and Nebraska has almost been worse since our respective hay days and they aren't showing any signs of life.
 
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#21
#21
PlanetVolunteer said:
Why do people say we've been down for 15 years?

I think the real down years started in 2010 when we got Dooley.

Fulmer had two bad year's in 05 and 08.

06 and 07 we're both good. Kiffins team was good. Took Bammer to the wire. Shoulda won.

We were still fine then, it's when Kiffin rode off into the darkness that put us in the Dark Ages. Or when we decided to hire Derek Dooley.

It's really only been the last decade that has been so poor.

It's not that different from Bammers bad decade and Nebraska has almost been worse since our respective hay days and they aren't showing any signs of life.
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More revisionism. No, we were "not fine," 5-7 preceeded by the most incompetent streak of head coaching I've ever seen is what blasted us into the "Dark Ages" not the 12 months Kiffin spent in Knoxville.
 
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#22
#22
HoptownVol said:
More revisionism. No, we were "not fine," 5-7 preceeded by the most incompetent streak of head coaching I've ever seen is what blasted us into the "Dark Ages" not the 12 months Kiffin spent in Knoxville.
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I'm saying when Kiffin left is when things went real south. Yes they were trending down alread, but we hadn't reached hopelessness until Kiffin left us with sanctions and we hired Dooley. Before then we weren't the butt of all jokes yet and were still competitive with everybody.

From 05-09 the perception wasn't dark ages. It lead to the dark ages. It was the visigoths about to begin their descent into Rome. We were the butt of everyones jokes, we still had two good teams in that period, loads of talent and there was a lot of promise during Kiffins first year. Then he spurned us and we fell apart.
 
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#23
#23
The Dark Ages date to 2008. Fulmer's last year. That was the start of it.

Die-hard Fulmer defenders will claim it didn't start until after he left, but he has to own up to contributing to its beginning.

Meanwhile, die-hard Fulmer haters will try to stretch it back to '05 or even '01. Heck, I saw one guy a couple of years ago saying things went off the rails in '99, months after the national title. That's all hogwash too, of course.

No, it began in '08. The 5-7 season that got Phillip fired. It has, so far, lasted 12 years, give or take.

Really hoping we can look back at the 6-game winning streak in '19 as the beginning of the end of it.

As for whether our stretch has been worse than any other blue blood's, maybe so. Nebraska fans might argue with us. Maybe a couple of others. We've certainly had at least our share of misery.

Bright times ahead.

Go Vols!


EDIT: researched a bit to answer that question for you. And found out, no--our Dark Ages aren't the worst any blue blood has ever suffered.

So to set up a yardstick for comparison: we went 75-75, exactly .500, between '08 and '19. That's the measure of our pain. That's how we'll know if others had it as bad.

First, I checked Michigan. And yep, they had a significant dark period, too. 11 seasons, from '57 to '67 inclusive, where the Wolverines went 50-49-4 under two coaches, a fellow named Bennie Oosterbaan (2 seasons) and another guy named Bump Elliott for most of the time. I think Bump only stayed on as long as he did because in his 6th year, he led a 9-1 campaign capped by a Rose Bowl victory. Other than that one season, he was entirely mediocre in his results. Anyway, their .505 mark over 11 years is a very close match to our .500 over 12. Call it even.

But here's the kicker: Nebraska. Big time pain. They went 21 years, from '41 to '61, with only three winning seasons. And two of those were mediocre 5-4-1 and 6-5 outings. Their mark over those two decades, as they shuffled through coach after coach after coach, was a truly miserable 72-125-4. A .368 rating.

I could keep researching other blue bloods, but that Nebraska find was enough to convince me: we maybe have the most RECENT dark ages, but we definitely have not had the worst.

Bad enough for us, of course. Let's end them, now, fingers crossed.

Go Vols!
 
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#24
#24
PlanetVolunteer said:
I'm saying when Kiffin left is when things went real south. Yes they were trending down alread, but we hadn't reached hopelessness until Kiffin left us with sanctions and we hired Dooley. Before then we weren't the butt of all jokes yet and were still competitive with everybody.

From 05-09 the perception wasn't dark ages. It lead to the dark ages. It was the visigoths about to begin their descent into Rome. We were the butt of everyones jokes, we still had two good teams in that period, loads of talent and there was a lot of promise during Kiffins first year. Then he spurned us and we fell apart.
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LOL Oh man, you should post more. This is very entertaining, you're completely wrong, but the rapidity of how Vols fans have flushed the incompetence and failure over a long period of time I find hilarious. But yeah, lets blame it all on Kiffin.
 
#25
#25
VFL-82-JP said:
The Dark Ages date to 2008. Fulmer's last year. That was the start of it.

Die-hard Fulmer defenders will claim it didn't start until after he left, but he has to own up to contributing to its beginning.

Meanwhile, die-hard Fulmer haters will try to stretch it back to '05 or even '01. Heck, I saw one guy a couple of years ago saying things went off the rails in '99, months after the national title. That's all hogwash too, of course.

No, it began in '08. The 5-7 season that got Phillip fired. It has, so far, lasted 12 years, give or take.

Really hoping we can look back at the 6-game winning streak in '19 as the beginning of the end of it.

As for whether our stretch has been worse than any other blue blood's, maybe so. Nebraska fans might argue with us. Maybe a couple of others. We've certainly had at least our share of misery.

Bright times ahead.

Go Vols!
Click to expand...

One season didn't get Fulmer fired, sorry.
 
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