No one is saying that they can’t recover, only that it will take someone who is an elite recruiter and a great ingame coach to do it. There aren’t that many out there. So with the horrible instate recruiting it’s hard to expect the programs like Nebraska and Tennessee to achieve anything better than Mike Shula did at Alabama.
I'm very curious to see how Frost does at Nebraska. He's an ace recruiter and seems to be pulling talent form Florida already.
Well, Phatlock's last team went 5-7. Then follows 7-6, 6-7, 5-7, 5-7, 5-7, 7-6, 9-4, 9-4, and 4-8 so I give Phil credit for setting the trend.
I don’t think there is a better 10 year run in Vols history than 97-07. The truth is the Vols need serious outside help and inside consistency to be competitive. They need 2 of their 3 rivals to be down and take advantage of those teams recruits. Phatlock achieved this through the 95 and 00 sanctions.
I think Saban killed Phillip Fulmer's career trajectory well before coming to Alabama. That 2001 SECCG was a watershed moment because UT was legitimately the only college team talented enough to beat Miami but they never even got their shot due to that flop against a backup LSU quarterback.
I think 08-17 is probably the best 10 year run in their history from my viewpoint. :biggrin2:
I don’t think anyone was beating Miami in 2001 but I do think Tennessee was the best team to compete with them.
Phil’s days were numbered when Roy Kramer stepped down. Saban was just the final nail.
Yeah, the SEC became a lot better atmosphere after those two clowns left...
It's true that Neb's instate recruiting is still very poor, but the state of Tennessee has been having a stunning surge in producing Div 1 recruits. Primarily because of the massive recent growth in the Nashville area (over 2 mil now, Bham 1 mil). This year is a great year in Alabama with 2 5 star and 12 4 star recruits, Tenn has 14 4 star recruits. Tenn has 120 recruits listed by 247 sports, 4th in the SEC behind Texas 400+, Fla 250+, Ga 200+, Alabama is 5th behind Tenn with 113, Miss with 85... So, Tenn has 120-85 edge over Miss with no instate competition like OM. As well, even though Bama usually gets most of whom they want instate, AU still gets a few. i.e., UT already or will have an instate recruiting advantage over Bama since it has little instate competition. One new drawback to UT instate recruiting is that since most of the top recruits are now coming from the Nashville area with it's inordinate number of new and transient residents, they don't have the loyalty that most instate residents normally would. That issue is intensified by the fact that UT has been bad most of the new players' lives. Of course, they still have the problems posed by the odd geography of the state, especially regarding Memphis. It's bad fortune for UT that the state's 2 hotbeds for talent (8 of their 14 4 stars are from Nash alone, 5 of the other 6 are from Memphis) are not as easy to pick from as one would ordinarily think. But Tenn's dearth of instate talent is a thing of the past. It will only get better for the foreseeable future. (OTOH, Bama has historically had some success in the Nashville and Memphis areas.) UT does well in the Atlanta area. Pruitt has already had success there this year.
