The Tennessee Vols handed the national media another huge L and UT fans should be smiling about it
The national media has been waging war against the Tennessee Vols for nearly a decade and they don't have a win to show for it yet. In 2017, the national media roasted Vols fans for thwarting the attempted hire of Greg Schiano. Tennessee fans revolted and the hire, fortunately for the Vols, fell through. Schiano […]
The national media has been waging war against the Tennessee Vols for nearly a decade and they don't have a win to show for it yet.
In 2017, the national media roasted Vols fans for thwarting the attempted hire of Greg Schiano. Tennessee fans revolted and the hire, fortunately for the Vols, fell through. Schiano might do alright from time to time at Rutgers, but he would've been an absolute disaster at Tennessee (and in the SEC in general). The last thing the Vols needed in 2017 was a Butch Jones clone and that's exactly what Schiano would've been with his endless supply of corny slogans.
In early 2021, after Jeremy Pruitt, the coach that Tennessee hired instead of Schiano, was fired due to an NCAA recruiting scandal, the national media did a victory lap. They felt vindicated in their criticism of Tennessee fans and the "uprising" that prevented the Schiano hire. Some media members even suggested it would be at least five years before the Vols returned to a bowl game.
The Vols, of course, went to a bowl game later that year thanks to the hiring of Josh Heupel, who immediately turned things around at Tennessee.
Another big L for the national media.
Last month, the national media thought they were finally going to break through in their ongoing fight against Tennessee and its passionate fan base. News broke, via Pat Forde (the de facto leader of the national media's assault against the Vols), that the NCAA had opened an inquiry into Tennessee's NIL dealings — specifically surrounding quarterback Nico Iamaleava's NIL deal.
The national media thought they had finally won. The battle was over. Tennessee's short-lived success under Heupel was done.
Or so they thought.
Only that wasn't the case. The state of Tennessee (along with Virginia) filed a lawsuit against the NCAA. And on Friday, a judge granted a preliminary injunction that prevents the NCAA from enforcing NIL rules that prevent booster-funded NIL collectives from communicating with high school recruits.
The lawsuit is still pending, but it seems incredibly unlikely at this point that the NCAA will emerge victorious. In fact, it wouldn't be a surprise if they drop their inquiry into Tennessee's NIL dealings as it would be futile to pursue "rules violations" that the NCAA can't currently enforce/punish.
Forde, one of the original bro media members that loves to dunk on Tennessee (which always fails at doing), tweeted the news on Friday like he was a social media manager tweeting the final score of a blowout loss (shoutout GRITknox for the reference).
Maybe the national media will finally realize they're not smarter than Vols fans like they love to think. In fact, it's quite the opposite.
Important part of Tennessee Vols football won’t be included in new EA Sports College Football game
The game is expected to come out in the summer
