A milestone from Saturday

[BanditVol]

First 9 win regular season since 2007.   

We all know this is the best season in a long time, but its still fun to check the boxes as they occur.   

With a win this Saturday, it will be the first 10 win regular season since 2003.

With a win vs Vandy, first 11 win season since 2001

If we make the playoffs and win in the first round, best season since 1998

If we win it all, one of the best seasons ever.    

[Black Diamond Vol]

As far as “coming out of nowhere” goes, this season has to top the list, right? I can only vaguely remember the buildup to ‘85, but I’m pretty sure no one saw that coming. In 88, we were coming off a 5-6 year and rebounded to go 11-1. But everyone knew we underachieved in 87. Those teams were just stupidly talented. 92- ah, what could’ve been. Moving on. 98 was seen as a rebuilding year after losing Peyton, Brown, Little, Fair, etc. But we were a recruiting machine at that time. We just replaced 5 stars with more 5 stars and won it all.  04 was kinda out of the blue. A trip to Atlanta with two freshmen QBs was a pleasant surprise.

But this year? We have a roster full of 3 stars. Our talent level is still in the bottom half of the SEC. NOBODY saw this coming. Most of us would’ve been satisfied with 8-4. If we finish strong, I think this will go down as the best single-season coaching job since Bob Stoops in 2000.

[Creek Walker]

As far as “coming out of nowhere” goes, this season has to top the list, right? I can only vaguely remember the buildup to ‘85, but I’m pretty sure no one saw that coming. In 88, we were coming off a 5-6 year and rebounded to go 11-1. But everyone knew we underachieved in 87. Those teams were just stupidly talented. 92- ah, what could’ve been. Moving on. 98 was seen as a rebuilding year after losing Peyton, Brown, Little, Fair, etc. But we were a recruiting machine at that time. We just replaced 5 stars with more 5 stars and won it all.  04 was kinda out of the blue. A trip to Atlanta with two freshmen QBs was a pleasant surprise.

But this year? We have a roster full of 3 stars. Our talent level is still in the bottom half of the SEC. NOBODY saw this coming. Most of us would’ve been satisfied with 8-4. If we finish strong, I think this will go down as the best single-season coaching job since Bob Stoops in 2000.

I think this ranks up there towards the all-time great single-season turnarounds. And the 1989 team is probably on the list, too. Yes, that was a very talented '89 team (way more talented than this year's team) but it was a team that had done a whole lot of nothing...really since the '85 Sugar Bowl win over Miami. The '86 team started 2-5 before closing on a 5-game winning streak. The '87 season was a good one in terms of W/L, but it ended poorly. Boston College won a game they should've never won, then Majors squeaked out wins over bad Kentucky and Vanderbilt teams before struggling to beat Indiana in the Peach Bowl. Then the start to the '88 season was an unmitigated disaster at 0-6. That '89 team had a lot of potential, but that's really all it was — potential — until they came out and hammered UCLA at the Rose Bowl.

Obviously that 2000 Oklahoma team is one of the all-time great turnarounds, going from 7-5 to an undefeated national championship season. Another one that would have to rank up there is Alabama in 2008. They go from 6-6 to 12-0 and ranked No. 1 in the country before losing to Florida in the SEC Championship Game. The thing that 2000 Oklahoma, 2008 Alabama and 2022 Tennessee all have in common is second-year head coaches.

[Black Diamond Vol]

I think this ranks up there towards the all-time great single-season turnarounds. And the 1989 team is probably on the list, too. Yes, that was a very talented '89 team (way more talented than this year's team) but it was a team that had done a whole lot of nothing...really since the '85 Sugar Bowl win over Miami. The '86 team started 2-5 before closing on a 5-game winning streak. The '87 season was a good one in terms of W/L, but it ended poorly. Boston College won a game they should've never won, then Majors squeaked out wins over bad Kentucky and Vanderbilt teams before struggling to beat Indiana in the Peach Bowl. Then the start to the '88 season was an unmitigated disaster at 0-6. That '89 team had a lot of potential, but that's really all it was — potential — until they came out and hammered UCLA at the Rose Bowl.

Obviously that 2000 Oklahoma team is one of the all-time great turnarounds, going from 7-5 to an undefeated national championship season. Another one that would have to rank up there is Alabama in 2008. They go from 6-6 to 12-0 and ranked No. 1 in the country before losing to Florida in the SEC Championship Game. The thing that 2000 Oklahoma, 2008 Alabama and 2022 Tennessee all have in common is second-year head coaches.

I think the comp for us is 2000 OU, because the talent levels are similar. Bama had a lot of great players on that team. While he obviously wasn’t the recruiting machine that Saban is now, Mike Shula still had a bunch of top 10 classes (that he could do nothing with on the field). He didn’t leave an empty cupboard when he was fired.

[BanditVol]

I think the comp for us is 2000 OU, because the talent levels are similar.

And there is another similarity 

[BanditVol]

As far as “coming out of nowhere” goes, this season has to top the list, right? I can only vaguely remember the buildup to ‘85, but I’m pretty sure no one saw that coming. In 88, we were coming off a 5-6 year and rebounded to go 11-1. But everyone knew we underachieved in 87. Those teams were just stupidly talented. 92- ah, what could’ve been. Moving on. 98 was seen as a rebuilding year after losing Peyton, Brown, Little, Fair, etc. But we were a recruiting machine at that time. We just replaced 5 stars with more 5 stars and won it all.  04 was kinda out of the blue. A trip to Atlanta with two freshmen QBs was a pleasant surprise.

But this year? We have a roster full of 3 stars. Our talent level is still in the bottom half of the SEC. NOBODY saw this coming. Most of us would’ve been satisfied with 8-4. If we finish strong, I think this will go down as the best single-season coaching job since Bob Stoops in 2000.

Nit...you mean that 89 was a turnaround from 88.  I know we had plenty of talent back then, but I was definitely shocked at the 1989 season...pleasantly of course.  That was my senior year so I greatly enjoyed it.

Another nit...our recruiting was actually in the top half of the SEC almost throughout the last 10-12 years, with a couple of exceptions (like Jones and Dooleys final seasons).  That isn't to say it was great, it was probably still well down the list but IIRC we probably averaged about 6th.  Our coaches defintely underachieved with the talent they had, all of them even Kiffin IMO.  Not that we had great talent, but let's put it this way...our record since Fulmer is 11th in the conference and over the decade of the 2010s it's 10th.  That's underachieving for sure!

Now, factoring in the portal departures we may well be in the bottom half, but we did pretty well out of the portal also.  I have no idea how the portal affects us, I guess it could be figured out, but yeah, given what I would call mediocre recruiting (but not terrible) and departures, this is an amazing season for sure.  That goes without saying!

Just don't give Poot and Jones too much of an excuse.  They should have been better than they were for sure.