Are my early pick to be the 2016 national champions. I'll admit I doubted Butch Jones when he was hired but he's getting it done. They were 9-4 this season but.....they had a 14 point lead in three of the four losses and in the other they had the lead late in the game at Alabama. They were easily the most talented team we played this year IMO. If the QB doesn't get hurt they're about to explode. Plus, they get Alabama at home and their OOC test is Va Tech in Bristol who they'll absolutely roll.
Tennessee Volunteers
- Thread starter gojvc
- Start date
Oh yeah, I forgot they're in the same division as us. The kiss of death. They're screwed. Scratch the prediction.
They can most definitely compete for the East but I don't think they'll be true NC contenders just yet.
On a side note Butch was my first choice to replace Joker. Just had to pat myself on the back a little.
On a side note Butch was my first choice to replace Joker. Just had to pat myself on the back a little.
Cincy has a knack for finding good coaches... Now we snuck there oc and qb coach!
Don't know anything about there AD but he doesn't get enough credit in my book.
UC would be in a P5 league had they invested in their athletics a little heavier back when Louisville started pouring money into theirs. Their lack of foresight has them stuck in neutral and on the outside looking in. If they dont find a way into a P5 league I look for all of their sports to die a slow death as the P5 slowly pulls away a year at a time. IMO WKU is on more of an upward trajectory and they are following the same path as UL and few others took. Unfortunately for the Toppers I think the clock wills strike midnight before they catch up enough and they are destined (moreso than UC who still has a chance) to always be on the outside looking in.
I don't think UT has any chance at winning the NC. I think they are still a year away. I do think they will be the favorite for the East but I don't think they get out undefeated or with 1 loss and win the SEC Championship game. They play Va Tech on neutral field. They will play UF, UGA, A&M, and Bama.in consecutive weeks.
They'll beat a turd out of Va Tech. The four game stretch will be tough but I don't think 3-1 is out of the question at all given the who/where of those games.
Yeah but they have to go through a summer without them filling the Knoxville jails while partying downtown. I know the Knoxville Police Department is not looking forward to it. lol
Shame on the OP for ever saying anything as horrible as that. As our biggest rival historically, I'd hope you were just joking.....
Sure it did, when they drop kicked that one officer in the head, I heard the Tennessee player was so depressed for about a whole day.
Just another SEC team, it's not like I said it about Louisville. Of course, it wouldn't be true about Louisville anyway because they aren't winning any NC's.
Yeah, not sure that officer even went to the hospital from the kick itself, the other one kicked WHILE DOWN by the EIGHT players did get a concussion, among other things. And, despite all the denials by the Vol fans on here NO ONE was charged for ANYTHING for the two COWARDLY assaults, the only charges were evading arrest and resisting arrest later on.
Hey, it ain't like they hired a bunch of strippers for recruits or something really low-life like that.
"UC would be in a P5 league had they invested in their athletics a little heavier back when Louisville started pouring money into theirs. Their lack of foresight has them stuck in neutral and on the outside looking in."
Wow, that struck a note with me, here, let me correct it for you:
UK would be competitive in a P5 league had mitch invested in their football program a little heavier back when EVERYONE ELSE (including Vandy) started pouring money into theirs. The lack of foresight has us stuck in neutral and on the outside looking in.
MUCH better situation today, did mitch have a choice, really? Still he obligated the athletic department for a hundred million or so for academics when all that time he claimed there was no way to raise the original hundred million or so needed------hell, he didn't even have to raise more money for football for the obvious things (recruiting room, for one), all he had to do was spend more of the money football was responsible for on FOOTBALL-----which, being the best investment around would have meant even more money to spend on the minor sports. UK football is still MILLIONS behind because of the fan revolt, the strike against him, loss of long time fans, and the skepticism even today even though Stoops is doing a fantastic job in correcting UK's biggest problem for decades------lack of SEC talent and depth.
We dug ourselves a huge hole while other teams were making progress, no one should expect the problem to be cured overnight. The offense should be MUCH improved next year, who did we lose that couldn't be (already have been) replaced, and hopefully the coaching just took a big jump. I can't wait until the 14 class becomes seasoned 4 year veterans with a lot of good talent joining them, including a fantastic group of young OL.
I expect another big jump in recruiting when we start playing in bowl games, these recruits have been sold on our program with very disappointing results on the field, I can't wait to see what these great recruiters AND evaluators can do when we start winning.
Butch Jones isn't a good enough coach for UT to ever win a national title.
Uhh, I was talking about our real rival, UT and not a faux 'rival' in Louisville that a few fans just decided to not like anymore. UK-UL is a cute little rivalry that absolutely no one cares about outside of Louisville.
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To be realistic on UT....how they lost 4 games with how impressive they looked at times is an indictment of Butch Jones as much as it is an endorsement IMO.
- I can't find a reasonable equation of how UT does not win the east next year. UF QB issues look to be very significant heading into next year and alot of that defense is going to NFL. UGA has a brand new coach and QB problems almost as bad as UF does. USC, Mizzou, UK and Vandy are not really even close in talent to compete.
- If UT does win the East, they can win a 1 game playoff in SEC title game. You never know..and that squad could easily be in NCAA playoff next year.
- I can't find a reasonable equation of how UT does not win the east next year. UF QB issues look to be very significant heading into next year and alot of that defense is going to NFL. UGA has a brand new coach and QB problems almost as bad as UF does. USC, Mizzou, UK and Vandy are not really even close in talent to compete.
- If UT does win the East, they can win a 1 game playoff in SEC title game. You never know..and that squad could easily be in NCAA playoff next year.
jauk, when the coal market dried up, UofK lost a lot of money. For years, money from Eastern Kentucky helped support UofK athletics. Remember when coal money built the lodge for the basketball players. It's no longer available.
OLD STOLL FIELD GUY!
OLD STOLL FIELD GUY!
The ACC wishes they had invited UC over ul at this point. UC is a bigger market, better at FB most years and would be a better BB program in the long run. The only thing ul has is they get a lot of viewers from Louisville for games because there is nothing to do there except watch sports unlike other areas and better cities.
I think the in game coaching verdict on Butch is still out but I put more of the losses on the players than the coaches. On Florida's last TD of the game, 4th and 14, we had 4 players within 5 yards of the WR when he caught the ball and they all wiffed. In the OU game we had a TE drop a wide open TD that would of put us up 24-0. That's on the players. Now I do think in the Florida game the coaches put the game in the defenses hands and got conservative on O. Tenn hasn't had a problem being prepared for games but it seems adjusting to the other teams adjustments is a real concern.
As much as it pains me to say this, they were damn close to contending for the title this year. Losing double digit leads in the 4th quarter and leading Bama late in the 4th. They were that close to being undefeated heading into the SEC championship game. They will have put 4 very good recruiting classes together and will be very strong next year. Bama is losing quite a bit of offense next year, top 2 RB, QB, TE, not sure on their OL plus will lose some of that defense, OM may finally get to the SEC championship game in 16 and very likely facing UT. Unless Kelly goes nutcase or decides to leave early.
I really hope you're wrong. In a perfect world, they'd be picked to win the East, only to win a couple of games
I don't think this has happened just yet, but unfortunately I definitely think it will be coming in the near future.
UT fans do not consider UK a rival. So based on your theory, UT/UK is a rivalry no one cares about outside of Lexington. UT fans consider Alabama, Florida, UGA, SC, and even Vandy (very true) rivals over us.
Lol that's not true. I guarantee you that if Kentucky starts winning more often, that rivalry will get back to where it was quickly. Trust me on that.
It has been pretty obvious for a long time that football was the emerging "money cow", and most of the money coming in from the huge TV contracts (and the OTHER SEC teams BCS bowls) is due mostly to football, even if it is due to other SEC teams. Anyone in sports should have recognized that, certainly an AD, the other SEC schools did. Football was and is one of the best investments in the world right now, and has been for a while, money invested in it would have made MORE money available for the minor sports. Instead he drove football into the ground and alienated thousands of football fans, costing UK literally millions AND losing lots of long suffering ticket holders, who found out about the advantages of HDTV and staying home. Even with the improvements lots will never return, and skepticism abounds.
Haven't you seen the pictures of the "recruiting room", the biggest disgrace to a STATE UNIVERSITY possible. I can assure you that recruits we were competing with other SEC schools for saw it. Yes, he had no money for over a decade to at least replace the folding chairs, carpet the floor, replace the portable projection screen, maybe even put up some walls and a ceiling in the WAREHOUSE, but my view is that he could have done all that with the $156,000 (159,000?) he spent putting some pictures on a wall somewhere, and I think he did that to show the "microwave" fans (the AD should be a PR man, our AD needed a PR man to speak for him) who was boss.
His handling of the KFund was an epic fail, IF he had to spend all the football donar's money on his sports, he did a lousy job of explaining why, several long threads on here by fans swearing to never donate a penny to athletics as long as he was in charge of the KFund. Now that money is being invested in football the $50,000,000 for the new football facility (ten years after BB got theirs-----along with the best of everything else) has been raised from DONATIONS-----and I don't think coal has rebounded that much, in fact even gasoline is way down.
Weird how the LOAN with interest money for the TWO YEARS overdue scoreboards replacement was turned down by the jealous faculty (and actually they have reason to be jealous, way too much attention paid to sports IMO, I hope my grandson in grade school that was one of THREE in the 318,000 student CCSD, mostly adults I realize, to qualify for the Gifted And Talented Education program gets half the benefits a three star football player gets) was replaceable in about ONE DAY. Right, couldn't possibly have been done sooner. Loucatfan started a long thread at ticket renewal time trying to get a commitment to do it to try to keep his tailgating party together, but while he must have had some plans for getting it done nothing was announced until the last minute. Just a few of his major goofs in football.
Lucky man, lucky hires in our two major sports lately, IMO, but anyone with a brain should be able to see that UK couldn't continue to hemorrhage money in football, which we were doing, and the fan rebellion PLUS all the money available (mostly due to the other SEC football programs) gave him no choice, he had to do something. And the athletic department, which couldn't possibly finance the CW improvements alone, did it by being able to be responsible for almost twice that much money, they couldn't finance about $100,000,000 for CW but can afford to be responsible for almost twice that much and give a lot of it to academics------a good thing, IMO, I am glad we aren't a city college.
Sorry, but I think mitch was a major factor in the huge hole our coaches are trying to dig us out of.
Like others have said. Once we start winning and beat them a couple times in a row, they will consider us their #1 rival again. Stoops will have us back on top soon.
I don't know if you will ever be UT's number 1 rival, Bama has been their number 1 rival for dang near 100 years. But beating them a few times in a row would make the game important to them.
I live basically in Knoxville. They still want to beat Kentucky. However, it is just something they have come to count on, and is something of an embarrassment if they don't. They want to win not out of real hatred, but because they believe it is inexcusable to lose to us. That's some sad **** to type.
They feel the same about us, think they are on Bama's level, or at least feel they should be.
Butch Jones has recruited on an incredible level and developed those guys very well...no doubt...
but the Vols can be beat...just contain Dobbs, or catch him on an off day...their 3 losses this year, Dobbs had tough games...oklahoma limited him on the ground...bama got to him in the back field...Ark and Florida did a good job limiting his production his overall production...
but the Vols can be beat...just contain Dobbs, or catch him on an off day...their 3 losses this year, Dobbs had tough games...oklahoma limited him on the ground...bama got to him in the back field...Ark and Florida did a good job limiting his production his overall production...
I can verify that as being correct. Kentucky is to UT as Vandy is to UK, a game we have to win if the season is to be anything but a disaster.
Overall you have to hand it to Jones has really got UT on a fast track to the top IMO, they are now filling out their depth chart and maturing with an extremely talented roster. They will be a team to watch next year.
I had actually picked them to win the East this past season.
I agree with you they have so much talent that I would not be surprised to see them in the hunt.
Butch Jones has not proven that he can get it done though. He made some in-game coaching decisions comparable to Mark Stoops that cost them games. He has not proven himself yet.