Bowl invitations will be extended Sunday afternoon, and, believe it or not, Tennessee is expected to receive one.
The Volunteers closed out a 3-7 regular season Saturday with a 34-13 loss to No. 5 Texas A&M in Neyland Stadium. Three wins are typically half the number teams need to qualify for a bowl game under NCAA guidelines, but those were scrapped this year once the coronavirus pandemic started altering the number of games different leagues would stage.
Despite the reality of entering a postseason with seven losses in eight games after a 2-0 start, Tennessee seems up for the task.
“We’re preparing like we’re going to be in a bowl, and if we’re not, we’re not,” Vols coach Jeremy Pruitt said. “That’s the only way we know how to do it – just prepare and move forward like we were.”
A pair of Atlantic Coast Conference teams with 6-5 regular seasons, Boston College and Pittsburgh, recently announced they would be opting out of bowl games. Those programs cited the grind of this season amid a pandemic as the chief reason.