KNOXVILLE — It took Tennessee football coach Butch Jones less than two minutes Monday morning to remind every parent why he might be the best guy out there to coach their athletically gifted sons.
“Our first three practices will be in the evening because we have to win in the classroom first and foremost,” he said at the start of his preseason news conference inside the Stokely Family Media Center at Neyland Stadium.
“There are a couple of days left in summer school, so we don’t want to interfere with that.”
I’m certain that Jones isn’t the only head football coach from a Fat Cat Five conference who chooses to espouse his commitment to academics at the start of preseason practice. He’s just the only one who seems routinely to put academics first, regardless of what time of year it is.
So when his initial words have to do with winning in the classroom first and foremost – and he can point to a steadily improving team grade point average since his arrival in December 2012 to back up his rhetoric – it carries extra weight. It rings true. It screams of a coach with his priorities in order, which seems all too rare these days.