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What Should Pre-Season Coaching Poll Mean To Tennessee Vol Fans

By Randy Sharber

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The Tennessee Vol faithful have seen something today they have not seen in a long time. The Tennessee Vols are ranked in the Pre-Season Coaches Poll Top 25 for the first time since the 2008 season. That is when Barack Obama took office, and was then Head Coach Phillip Fulmer’s last season. It has been a while.

Tennessee ranked 25th in the Amway 2015 Coaches Poll posted today. The SEC leads the way with 8 teams in the Top 25. Those teams are Alabama (3), Auburn (7), Georgia (9), LSU (13), Ole Miss (15), Arkansas (20), Missouri (23), and Tennessee (25). Mississippi State and Texas A&M were the next two in line, so the SEC West almost got every team in the Top 25. It will never finish this way of course.

Ohio State was the  consensus number one. With the talent they have, and the schedule they play, they should almost be guaranteed a spot in the Championship game. The toughest two games they will have will be the opener against Virginia Tech (unranked) and Michigan State (6). Other than that it is a stroll in the park.

So what does this say about Tennessee? Obviously it shows the coaches think Head Coach Butch Jones is headed in the right direction. He has assembled talent worthy of a top 25 ranking. The coaches know it and the Tennessee fans know it. Let the fun begin.

But it should tell a few other things. It shows Tennessee fan that there are 5 Tennessee opponents ranked higher. The schedule is tough. Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma(19), Arkansas, and Missouri are all ranked above the Vols. Unlike Ohio State, the Vols have a lot of good teams to go through this season. It is like that every season in Knoxville and in the SEC of course, but it is a reality check. Tennessee is much better, but these other teams are pretty good as well.

It should also tell you about expectations. Expectations are high in Knoxville right now. They should be high. Tennessee is being recognized nationally for the first time in a long time. The Tennessee “brand” is back. As a fan, expectations can make for a memorable and enjoyable season. Expectations can also bring a lot of heartbreak.

Tennessee will be expected to be “in” every game they play this year. By that I mean competitive. No longer will we line up against the opponent and have talent that is simply not as good as theirs. That has been fixed for the most part. Yes, there are depth issues on this roster. Coach Jones knows this team is still not where he wants it to be from a depth perspective. But Tennessee won’t be overwhelmed.

So Tennessee should be able to keep games close. The recent years have seen games like Auburn, Oregon, Ole Miss, and Alabama where Tennessee looked like they did not have a chance. When these games got out of hand you knew it was over by halftime. You just dealt with it. This is not the case anymore.

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    • Now you will “expect” to win as a Tennessee fan. The games will be closer with the higher ranked teams, and in many cases it hurts more when you lose a close game. I expect that to happen. This team will have to learn to win those games. I think they made great strides last season when they came back and won the South Carolina game. But there is also the Florida game debacle, and Missouri as well. These are the ones Tennessee will have to win in order to stay in that Top 25. They must win the close ones.

    As a Tennessee fan I like it this way much better. I’ll take the crushing losses that come with following a team that is on the rise. I can take that much better than knowing we don’t even have a chance. As a lifelong Tennessee fan I had never gone into a game that I absolutely did not think there was a chance to win until Dooley’s last season, and Butch’s first. I never want to go back to that again.

    I was in school at UT in 1985 when the resurgence of Tennessee became complete. That is what I “expected”. To win. It was that simple. But now we will have to get accustomed to being in tight games again. We will have to learn to “win” again as well. We will have to be there for the team when it goes a little sideways for them. The boo birds can’t come out as quick as they have recently. We will have to learn what it takes to become winners again as well. That comes with how we treat the other team’s fans, the other team’s players, and how we conduct ourselves as representatives of the University of Tennessee, win or lose. I “expect” nothing less.

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