You also have to acknowledge you could win without the culture change. You always have culture so the question is what is the culture. Does that culture help you win?
What you are talking about is the idea and belief that a specific culture will create sustained winning. Implementing a specific culture is one approach, not the only. I do tend to agree implementing a specific culture is a more likely way to be successful over time, even when times are hard.
Now you can debate what is a good culture. Jones, Pruitt, and Heupel have different views on this and well every coach believes in their culture. We have seen the breakdown in the Jones and Pruitt eras when the wheels fell off bus. Their cultures were either not implemented (at all or well) or their cultures were not capable of sustaining them. I would argue those cultures were not good.
Television (and radio?) commentators have often talked about the "culture" of football and other sport programs. That has always seemed to me to be the wrong word. LIke they grasped for a phrase to capture a thought, even if it wasn't quite the right one.
Culture usually revolves around the arts in society. One definition says culture is, "the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group." But football programs don't have arts or social institutions or unique intellectual achievements. And the achievements they do have usually come in the form of wins or losses; something not unique at all, compared to the other programs around them.
I think what those TV personalities were trying to grab hold of were the
values of the program. What it stands for, what it wants to be known for. Finesse? Fine-tuned perfectionism? Or rough-handed workman attitude, roll your sleeves up and get your hands dirty? Misdirection and showmanship and sleight-of-hand, perhaps? Or raw power, steamrolling, no subtlety just pounding the rock over and over? Chivalry, or cut-throat piracy?
So. Values. What do we stand for, what do we value in ourselves?
That's what "culture" really means in the sports context, I think.
For Josh Heupel and Co, the values start with Family. Brotherhood. Love for one another. Commitment to one another. And then after that, quickness--mental quickness, to identify patterns and adjust to them, but also physical quickness to get back to the ball and get it snapped again before the other guy is ready.
That's the core of the new "culture," of the new value system for the Vols. Brotherhood, Family, Tight Bonds. And Quickness.
There's probably more. That's what we've seen so far.
p.s. Kiffin and Dooley and Jones and Pruitt all instilled a certain value system as well. None of them worked, but each of them were different than what came before. Kiffin's was all about irreverent fun, letting loose, thumbing your nose at the system while taking advantage of it. Dooley's was quasi-intellectual disdain, putting down those around you to make yourself look smarter. Jones was a showman, football as entertainment, Barnum and Bailey "lie to them as long as you're entertaining them, it's all a show." And Pruitt was built on mean-spirited hate. Respect no one, just go out and take what you want.
Clearly none of those worked. Because at the end of the day, none of them valued the players or the sport they were playing as noble causes in and of themselves. So none of them were sustainable.
And that's why we may just have a winner here. Finally be pulling ourselves up out of our Dark Ages. Too early to tell, but there's reason for hope.
Go Vols!
(2 am philosophical ramblings of a guy who went to bed too early the night before, lol)