1. Pruitt’s First Year
Though it didn’t go how he or Tennessee fans wanted, the top story of 2018 was still Jeremy Pruitt’s first year as the Vols’ head football coach.
Pruitt had never been a head coach at any level before he was tabbed to be UT’s head coach in December of 2017, and Vol fans were eager to see how he would perform in the 2018 season. There were highlights during Tennessee’s 2018 campaign, including wins against Auburn on the road and a ranked Kentucky squad in Neyland Stadium.
But there were more negatives than positives overall for Tennessee this season.
The Vols went 5-7 and failed to make a bowl game for the second straight year, and all but one of their losses came in blowout fashion. Tennessee lost by 20-plus points to West Virginia, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Missouri, and Vanderbilt. Their only loss that wasn’t a blowout was their loss on the road to South Carolina.
The ending of Tennessee’s season left a bad taste in the mouths of Vol fans. Missouri destroyed UT by a score of 50-17 for the second consecutive season, and Tennessee lost a third-straight game to Vanderbilt, and it wasn’t pariticularly close in that game either.
But for all the bad news the season brought, the future looks brighter (as always).
Pruitt and his staff brought in a solid 2018 signing class earlier in the year, and they closed out the 2019 early signing period with a bang. Currently, UT’s 2019 class ranks No. 13 in the country after a strong early signing class, and that class will likely only improve once National Signing Day comes in February.
It wasn’t what fans were hoping for, but Pruitt’s first season was the big focal point of 2018. Now fans (and himself) are hoping his second season will be much more memorable.
