Once was the time University of Tennessee athletics was synonymous with greatness on almost every front, nearly shaming the entire Southeastern Conference into caring about more than football.
Back in the 1970s, for instance, there were national championships in track and field and swimming. Ernie Grunfeld and Bernard King famously graced the cover of Sports Illustrated that same decade. Some lefty pitcher from Lakeview-Fort Oglethorpe named Rick Honeycutt starred on the baseball team. Pat Head Summitt was about to take over women’s college basketball. The 1970 football team shut out Alabama 24-0.
Cut to the 1990s and that same football program not only grabbed a national championship but won 45 games between 1995 and 1998.
That same decade the baseball team reached the World Series for the first time in more than 40 years. The Lady Vols basketball team tacked on three national championships. It was as if everything on Rocky Top was working like Clockwork Orange.
And if the early 2000s pretty much continued that trend as the Lady Vols added national titles, the baseball team reached two more World Series and the men’s basketball team briefly ascended to No. 1 under former coach Bruce Pearl, it also seemed as if everything came crashing to earth by 2011.