KNOXVILLE — There should be but one question on the lips of every University of Tennessee football fan this morning following Saturday night’s 13-9 win over Northern Illinois: What was Phillip Fulmer waiting on?

Specifically, why did it take Fulmer five games to make Nick Stephens the Volunteers’ starting quarterback over Jonathan Crompton?

For that matter, why was Stephens not the starter at the beginning of the season, instead of after the Vols limped to a 1-3 start largely on Crompton’s ineptness?

This is not to say every future UT opponent will be as easy for Stephens to pass against as NIU.

The Huskies are a tough mid-major program blessed with a solid defense and a somewhat irritating offense. NIU is clearly better than Alabama-Birmingham — the Vols’ lone previous victim this season — but also no threat to be mistaken for Georgia, Alabama or Vanderbilt, each of whom UT is yet to face.

Nor is Stephens likely to make the Big Orange Nation forget about Peyton Manning, or even Erik Ainge, in the near future. He’s a work in progress — just not quite so overwhelming a piece of work as Crompton, whose learning curve could make the national financial crisis look like figuring your children’s allowance.

Still, Stephens completed 11 of 18 passes for 156 yards, a touchdown and no interceptions. More importantly, he quarterbacked a much-needed win.

But the bigger question remains: What were the Vols waiting on? A solar eclipse? An astrological sign? A visit from Santa Claus?

Crompton exited last week’s 14-12 loss at Auburn having completed more passes to the enemy (4) than touchdowns (2) over the season’s first four games. Against the Tigers he missed 15 of 23 passes after misfiring on 22 of 41 against UCLA. Both his TDs came against UAB, by far the worst team on the Vols’ schedule.

Crompton was so bad against Auburn that most of his throws were more likely to find a cheerleader, mascot or stadium usher than a UT receiver, since most sailed far out of bounds.

But at least Crompton’s Auburn effort was bad enough for even Fulmer to see a desperate need to switch quarterbacks. He growled something about not being afraid to make a change, threw open the quarterback race a month too late and named Stephens the starter by the end of the week.

And if the change didn’t provide the kind of immediate upgrade that could make the Vols pregame favorites this coming Saturday at Georgia, it did provide a glimmer of hope that the remaining seven games could prove a good deal more satisfying than the first five.

“Oh, he was ready,” wide receiver Gerald Jones said of Stephens. “Before the first play, he was rushing the ref, ‘How much time do we have?’ He wanted to get started.”

Added wide receivers coach Latrell Scott, who probably felt his receivers were walking around with the bird flu the way Crompton kept avoiding them: “Everybody knows Nick’s a gamer. He made some good throws, got the ball out quick.”

If nothing else, Stephens delivers on the lone promise the UT staff previously made of Crompton — that he can hit the deep pass.

In the third quarter alone, he hit on completions of 43 and 52 yards, the latter a Peyton-perfect toss to Denarius Moore for the Vols’ lone touchdown.

It was the first TD surrendered by the Northern Illinois defense in 10 quarters and the first touchdown pass thrown by a UT quarterback since Crompton twice hit Jones in the UAB win. Think about that. Crompton failed to throw a single TD pass in three of UT’s first four games.

“I could make my reads, I didn’t feel rushed, and the receivers were getting open,” the Flower Mound, Texas, resident said afterward. “It was fun.”

It was certainly more fun than anything we saw in the first four games.

So is Stephens’ promotion permanent, or at least cemented through the Georgia game?

“Yes,” Fulmer replied when asked the question.

Great. But why, why, why did it take so long?