It is now been over 24 hours since Tennessee’s humiliating 34-7 loss to Kentucky in Neyland Stadium and this loss stings even more.
That was Kentucky’s first win over the Vols in Neyland Stadium since 1984. 36 Years. You thought that stat was bad? Well, buckle up.
The last time a Kentucky football team defeated the Vols by 27? 1935. No, I am not joking. 1935. Literally the last time Kentucky won by that margin was before World War II.
I have seen a lot of terrible moments in my 22 years of life as a Tennessee fan. The embarrassing loss to Wyoming in 2008, LSU and UNC in 2010, Oklahoma in 2015, Florida in 2017 and Georgia State last year, just to name a few.
This tops the list and it ain’t even close. This loss feels much worse than the Georgia State game. I have tried to give this guy opportunity after opportunity. Folks, this guy is not the answer and it is beyond obvious. We are in year three of the Jerry Pruitt era and we are getting blown out by freaking Kentucky at home.
We are not even competitive against Kentucky. We are paying a football coach over $4 million a year and this is the end result. We have a coach who refuses to give any other QB an opportunity. I have never seen a coach give a quarterback as many opportunities as Pruitt has given to Jarrett Guarantano.
Guarantano throws two straight pick-sixes, you only give J.T. Shrout three plays as an opportunity, and you bring back Guarantano onto the field? What logic does that make?
It is year three now and we still do not have a QB. Pruitt has failed to develop Guarantano into being a competent QB. Sure, you can make the excuses that he has had a couple different OC’s and QB coaches. But this all comes down to the head coach. This is just inexcusable.
No one expected him to be a world-beater, but Guarantano is still making freshman mistakes. Having the same game plan and expecting different results week in and week out is the definition of insanity. Pruitt, yesterday, in the post-game press conference blamed his masks as part of the loss.
No this is not a joke, he literally said his mask caused communication issues. These excuses are just pathetic. These type of excuses are something Butch Jones would say.
You know what, Pruitt is a poor man’s Butch Jones. In fact, I would argue that he is worse than Jones.
29 games into his tenure at Tennessee, Jones was 14-15. Pruitt is 15-14. Yes, Pruitt’s record is better than Jones’ so far. But here is the difference between the two’s tenures.
Butch’s teams got better and were competitive against Florida and Oklahoma by year three. We are losing to Kentucky by 27 at home. This team and program is going backwards.
This team literally quit in the 3rd quarter when Kentucky scored their third touchdown. At least when it came to Butch’s teams, they would wait until November before they quit. At least Jones’ teams were fairly competitive against Florida and Georgia. At least Jones’ teams beat Kentucky.
We haven’t even made it halfway to the season and this team has appeared to quit. Much like this team, this fanbase is starting to quit on this football program. Alabama rolls into town this weekend and that will be a loss before we have a week off.
Pruitt and this team need to get it together and salvage this season in the second half of the season. But, if we continue to see what we saw Saturday, Tennessee isn’t winning another game this year.
