Lux Et Veritas Et Football

      The college football season kicks off this weekend, and I am very worried about my alma mater.   

      I’m a proud graduate of the University of Tennessee where, some 36 years ago, I obtained my Bachelor of Conservative Arts degree in football appreciation.  

      It has been said that here in the south there are three religions: Baptist, Methodist and football.  And believe me, I worship at Neyland Stadium on Saturdays in the fall.  It reminds me of the old joke people used to tell when the great Johnny Majors was coaching at UT:   

      Question – What do Johnny Majors and Billy Graham have in common?  

      Answer – They can both make 100,000 people in a football stadium all bow their heads and say, “Oh, Jesus!”  

      For many years, the University of Tennessee had one of college football’s greatest teams.  Harvard and Yale turn out Supreme Court justices, but the University of Tennessee turned out NFL wide receivers.  

      Just 12 years ago, the University of Tennessee won the National College Football Championship, and as recently as four years ago, the Volunteers played in the SEC Championship game and darned near won it, losing to eventual national champion LSU, 21 to 14.  

      But since that time, Tennessee has had three coaches and three consecutive losing seasons.  

      And this year, even with a dumbed down schedule (including such powerhouses as Montana, Buffalo and Middle Tennessee State), the Vols will be struggling to win six games and clinch a bid to the prestigious Poulan Weedeater Waterpick Chic-Fil-A Independence Freedom Kudzu Bowl.   

      Many of us in the Vol Nation have tried to figure out what in the heck happened to our football team.  Well, I believe I found the answer in the morning paper just a few days ago, and it wasn’t on the sports page.  It was on the front page under the headline “Students at UT Set Mark in ACT.”  According to the article, the University of Tennessee announced last week that its incoming freshman class has an average ACT score of 26.7 and an average GPA of 3.87.  The article indicated that this is part of a trend over the past five years as UT Knoxville has dramatically increased its academic standards.   

      When I applied to the University of Tennessee in 1970, all you had to have to get in was a vaccination, and the admissions office would waive that if you looked like you were generally healthy.   

      But now to get into my alma mater, an applicant must have not only have a vaccination, but a college admission test score and a GPA that automatically qualifies them for medical school.   

      Well, you don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar to figure out what’s happened to Tennessee football.  As the University has increased its academic standards, the football program has steadily declined.  

      This is not a coincidence.  There’s a reason Vanderbilt never plays in the Sugar Bowl.  It’s the same reason you never see MIT in the Rose Bowl or Harvard and Yale playing in the Tostidas Bank of America AT & T Martha White Self-Rising Flour Music City National Championship Game.  Simply put, there’s an inverse relationship between a university’s median SAT score and the win-loss record of its football team.  

      Several years ago, legendary UT President Andy Holt was asked by a newspaper reporter to state his goal for the University.  Without hesitation, Dr. Holt replied, “I would like to build an academic program that will make our football team proud!”  

      Well, believe me, Dr. Holt did not mean this, and at this moment, he is probably spinning in his orange and white grave.  

      Desperate times call for desperate measures.  Accordingly, I’m announcing today that I will be a candidate for the next opening on the University of Tennessee Board of Trustees.  Being a bright UT graduate, I realized that trustees are appointed by the Governor.  Accordingly, let me take this opportunity to make a public plea to Governor Haslam: Governor, since you grew up in Knoxville and served as Mayor of that great city before becoming Governor, I know you love the Vols.  I understand that you actually went to college at Emory, which doesn’t even have a football team, and this does cause me some concern about your leadership.  But since you spent all last year traveling across the Volunteer State in your campaign for Governor, you know how important football is to we the people.  And while I’m no Rhodes Scholar, I do know that 100,000 people do not pay $50 each to watch a UT professor teach a physics class.  

      I can’t remember what my ACT score was.  I also don’t remember my GPA, although I assure you it did not approach 3.8.  I did not graduate summa cum laude or magna cum laude.  I graduated thank you laude.  But I’m smart enough to know what’s really important at the University of Tennessee, and Guvnah, if you appoint me to the Board of Trustees, I will get the University back on the right path.  It’s not a path that leads to Oxford, unless it’s for a road game against Ole Miss.  It’s not a path that leads to Fulbright Scholarships or Nobel Prizes.  It’s a path that leads to Atlanta each December and to New Orleans in January.

      I’m afraid that if we don’t act now, my wonderful alma mater will become just like Vanderbilt.