The Tennessee Vols are lined up for one of the biggest games in recent years in Knoxville, as the No. 1 Texas Longhorns come to town for the first time ever.

Going into the game, it’s already been a good start to the season for Tennessee at 3-0, with all three wins, including a 45-24 romp over Georgia Tech, coming in impressive fashion.

So, what has that start done for Tennessee’s early postseason outlook? Both ESPN college football writers Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach predict Tennessee to land in the Citrus Bowl in Orlando on Jan. 2 in their latest bowl projections.

Tennessee predicted to land in Citrus Bowl by ESPN college football writers

Bonagura predicts the Vols to take on the Nebraska Cornhuskers, while Schlabach predicts Tennessee to square off against the Iowa Hawkeyes.

That’s an interesting prediction for both writers, who initially had the Vols far lower in the pecking order at the start of the season. The Citrus Bowl is the highest non-playoff bowl in the SEC, so whoever gets in there typically narrowly missed out on the playoff. Last year, the Texas Longhorns played in the Citrus Bowl as the highest SEC non-playoff team.

And the Vols being on the playoff bubble is something that ESPN’s Heather Dinich also wrote about this week. Dinich discussed the Vols, who she referred to as an SEC playoff “enigma”, having a higher playoff possibility than many might give Tennessee credit for right now.

ESPN’s Heather Dinich lists Tennessee as an ‘enigma’ for the College Football Playoff ahead of Texas clash

“Tennessee has the fifth-best chance in the SEC, though, to reach the playoff at 33.4%,” Dinich wrote. “This will fluctuate as the league’s members beat up on each other, but ESPN’s FPI gives Texas a 70% chance to prevail on Saturday. If that happens, Tennessee will still have plenty of chances to impress the committee — or tumble out — against Alabama, Texas A&M and LSU.”

An enigma is defined by Merriam-Webster as “something hard to understand or explain”. It might be a little bit premature to use that phrase with potential playoff teams, as we haven’t had enough time to evaluate teams through just three full weeks of play.

That said, it is interesting (and encouraging) for Tennessee that they have the fifth-best playoff odds among SEC teams, as Dinich lists Texas, Georgia, Ole Miss, LSU, and Alabama in as of now. But those odds surely bake each team’s respective schedules into the cake, so they see some paths as tougher than others.

In any event, what isn’t hard to understand or explain is that if the Vols can take care of business on Saturday and upset the No. 1 team in the nation, we will see some major revisions among the supposed experts this time next week.

Saturday is a tremendous opportunity for Josh Heupel’s team, and we’ll find out in five days if they can capitalize on it and land a signature win for their resume.