For nearly 20 football seasons, David Cutcliffe directly impacted Tennessee’s offensive fortunes.
Now, his influence on the Volunteers will be felt defensively.
The 71-year-old hasn’t roamed the sidelines since his 14th and final season as Duke’s head coach in 2021, but new Vols defensive coordinator Jim Knowles spent eight seasons (2010-17) in that role under Cutcliffe with the Blue Devils. New Tennessee cornerbacks coach Derek Jones worked at Duke for 12 seasons (2008-19) under Cutcliffe.
Jones played at Ole Miss and was a graduate assistant on Cutcliffe’s first Rebels team in 1999, while Knowles spent the 2003 season with Cutcliffe in Oxford.
“I know an awful lot about Tennessee because I was a graduate assistant for Coach Cutcliffe when he first left Tennessee,” Jones said during a recent news conference. “I know a lot of the traditions, a lot of the history and the game maxims. Coach Cutcliffe talked a lot to Coach Pat Summitt and shared a lot of the same leadership things, so it was a part of my early DNA. He and Coach (Phillip) Fulmer would interact a lot, and I met a lot of people from Tennessee and worked with a lot of people from Tennessee.
“Being an SEC guy and knowing how successful that they have been, that was a huge part of my upbringing in the coaching profession. Coach Cutcliffe would pull out a binder that he got from Johnny Majors, and Coach Majors got a chance to come visit us a couple of different times. That was a lot of my young foundation in coaching and a lot of the principles that I still use today.”
Cutcliffe now works for Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey as a special assistant for football relations.
He began his coaching career in 1976 at the former Banks High School in Birmingham, Alabama, and joined Tennessee’s staff under Majors in 1982, becoming a full-time assistant in 1983. The Vols struggled through a 35-32-2 stretch during the first six seasons of the Majors era in 1977-82 before going 9-3 in 1983 and 9-1-2 in 1985, when they won the program’s first SEC title since 1969.
Cutcliffe was Tennessee’s tight ends coach from 1983-88, with those 1985 “Sugar Vols” capping their magical run with a 35-7 shellacking of No. 2 Miami in the Sugar Bowl.
“That Miami team was one of the most talented teams in the history of college football, and we beat them badly,” Cutcliffe said during a 2022 interview with the Times Free Press. “Jeff Smith was our tight end and played a big role. We came up with a schematic thing about splitting him out and moving him around, and they never adjusted very well.
“Ken Donahue put a defensive masterpiece together to just blow Vinny Testaverde, Alonzo Highsmith and all those great players out of the water. We finished No. 4, but we may have been the best team in the country at the end of that season.”
Cutcliffe served as Tennessee’s running backs coach in 1989 before taking over the quarterbacks from 1990-98, adding the role of offensive coordinator in 1993 under Fulmer, who was in his first full season as head coach. Cutcliffe was Peyton Manning’s offensive coordinator for all four of the quarterback’s seasons in Knoxville from 1994-97 and called the plays during Tennessee’s first 12 games of its 1998 undefeated and national championship season before leaving for Ole Miss, his first head-coaching opportunity.
The most memorable play from that 1998 season was Vols defensive tackle Billy Ratliff causing the Clint Stoerner fumble that abruptly swung the momentum and enabled Tennessee to pull out a 28-24 win over Arkansas in Knoxville. The Razorbacks were leading 24-22 at the time of Stoerner’s miscue, and there was still the matter of Tennessee being at the Arkansas 43-yard line with 1:43 left.
“I remember Phillip saying, ‘We’ve got to hurry up and get down the field. We’ve got to throw the ball,'” Cutcliffe said in 2022. “I said, ‘We’re not throwing a single pass. We’re going to run power and isolation. We’re going to give the ball to Travis Henry, and we’re going straight down to score. No excuses. No regrets.’
“Our players really executed. I don’t know if Phillip would have fired me or not if we didn’t score.”
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Cutcliffe would coach Eli Manning at Ole Miss, with the 2003 Rebels in Manning’s senior year posting a 10-3 record that included a Cotton Bowl win over Oklahoma State. Knowles was the linebackers coach for that team.
“Coach Cutcliffe is like a father to me,” Knowles said recently on “The Mike Keith Show” at utsports.com, “and his relationship with Tennessee and Peyton Manning was always talked about. He loved it here. He had a major influence in my life in terms of how to leave a place better than you found it. When we were at Duke, we had all of these David Cutcliffe sayings, like, ‘A good carpenter doesn’t complain about his tools.’ Those sayings from him run through my mind all the time.
“I’ve definitely kept in touch with him over the years. He’s been a big supporter of my career, and even though he was an offensive guy, he and I sat down during my time at Duke and really continued to work on what I did defensively. I got a lot of great input from Coach Cut.”
The Vols will begin spring practice March 16, with their Orange & White Game set for April 11.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.