KNOXVILLE - Tee Martin is back.
Twenty seasons after quarterbacking Tennessee to its last football national championship, Martin has agreed to join the Volunteers' offensive staff, according to an ESPN report.
According to the report, Martin's role has yet to be finalized. The Vols currently have 11 on-field coaches, meaning that for Martin to be an on-field coach somebody on staff would have to leave or be demoted.
Martin will be paid by Southern California, where he had been on staff since 2012, for the next two years.
He chose an offer from the Vols over opportunities to coach at Alabama, Auburn, Louisville, Maryland and Vanderbilt.
Martin's college coaching career started in 2009, when he was the quarterbacks coach at New Mexico under new Maryland head coach Mike Locksley. He moved to Kentucky in 2010, where he spent two seasons as a wide receivers coach and the 2011 season as the passing game coordinator.
At USC he coached wide receivers while also serving as the passing game coordinator in 2014-15 and the past three seasons as the offensive coordinator. The Trojans won 26 games those last three seasons, including the 2016 Rose Bowl and the 2017 Pac-12 championship, and the offense averaged 31.2 points and 450.5 yards per game during that span. Six receivers were first- or second-team All-Pac 12 during Martin's time, with Marquise Lee being named the league's offensive player of the year in 2012.
Eight receivers who have been coached by Martin - six from USC, two from Kentucky - are currently in the NFL. In addition, Trojans quarterback Sam Darnold was the third pick in the 2018 NFL draft by the New York Jets.
Martin was a semifinalist for the Broyles Award in 2017, given to the top assistant coach in college football, and he's widely recognized as one of the best recruiters in the country.
Martin played for current Tennessee athletic director Phillip Fulmer. He backed up Peyton Manning for two seasons before leading the Vols to the 1998 national championship and the 1999 Southeastern Conference title. In his two seasons as a starter, Martin threw for 4,381 yards and 31 touchdowns
He was drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers and spent four seasons in the NFL.
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenley3 or at Facebook.com/VolsUpdate.