Jones says Vols will be motivated, more notes

In the last month of the season Tennessee saw it’s likely bowl destination bounce from some sunny spot in Florida to perhaps reveling in New Orleans for New Years until finally on Sunday it was announced the Vols would finish their the 2016 season in Nashville’s Music City Bowl, less than 200 miles from campus.

That’s a let down no matter how you try to frame it and is a direct result of a 3-2 finish to the season that included losses to South Carolina and Vanderbilt.

That kind of precipitous fall in postseason prospects might, for some teams, be an issue in terms of motivation. After all, most close observers expected Tennessee to be representing the SEC East in Atlanta this past weekend.

Among many other topics related to his program, on Monday Butch Jones addressed the question of his team’s attitude towards closing out against Nebraska in the Music City Bowl.

“If you’re a competitor, you have another opportunity to compete. When you look at playing a program like Nebraska that started the season off 7-0. You look at the history of their program, I have a lot of good friends on their coaching staff. I know what they’re building at Nebraska. It’s going to be a great challenge for us,” Jones said in addressing whether or not his team would be motivated for the upcoming contest against the Cornhuskers.

“Anytime you have another chance to compete, if you’re a competitor, you look forward to that, and we have great competitors here on our football team.”

Seniors Latroy Lewis and Josh Dobbs both echoed Jones’ sentiment. Lewis, who as a fifth-year senior, is one of just three remaining holdovers from the Derek Dooley era, went so far as to suggest this year wasn’t a disappointment in light of what he’s been through.

“It’s definitely not a disappointment. Eight wins on the season, that’s a good year,” Lewis said, a notion that some fans would probably dispute. “I probably could sit here and talk to numerous friends playing around the country and they’d trade for our eight wins in a heartbeat.

“It’s something we really need to sit down on the inside and look at and really be proud of our accomplishment. To win eight games in the Southeastern conference, against the type of opponents we’ve played this year. It’s really an accomplishment.

“I don’t think we’ll have a tough time getting up to play (the bowl). We have guys who love football, who are excited to play.

“I don’t see that being a problem for us.”

For the program, on the positive side, this does make three straight bowl games in a row after a three year drought. From a purely objective perspective, that’s definite progress.

For many fans out there, that are part of a passionate and demanding fanbase, this season is being viewed as a disappointment.

Jones was quick to acknowledge that his team didn’t close the season in strong fashion. He did, however, respectfully disagree with the notion that the outside perception of Tennessee is one of a program in disarray or on the way down.

An opinion Jones said was formed during his recruiting travels across the country last week to visit with prospects, their families and high school coaches.

“Being out on the road has been almost therapeutic for me. The houses that we’ve gone into, the high schools…the perception of Tennessee football has been extremely positive,” Jones relayed.

“The reception that we’ve received whether going into houses (are positive). Our coaches have done a very good job of building those relationships over a long period of time.

As the Vols begin their nearly a month preparation, Jones said that Tennessee will not get any injured players back.

“Chance Hall will be out for the Music City Bowl,” Jones said. “He will not play. He underwent successful surgery. We expect to have him back in the winter months and will have him back for spring football which will be great for his development.”

“The individuals who played a the end of the year are they guys who will play in the bowl game.”

After spending Sunday night with Cam Akers, Butch Jones met with the media and went straight back on the road recruiting to see Shannon Reid and DeAndre Johnson down in Florida.

"All my focus is on recruiting and I think we are on the verge of assembling a top notch recruiting class to address a lot of our needs moving forward," Jones said.

The lone official visitor last weekend with Trey Smith. Pictures flooded social media showing the big time offensive lineman with the current players during his official visit. They know how important it is to keep building through recruiting.

"I've been really proud of our players," Jones said. "In the recruiting process, your greatest ambassadors are your players. When we got here, it was hard to find an individual that wanted to host a perspective student athlete when they came on campus. Now we have players showing up in our offices helping shape this recruiting class. All of our players have done an exceptional job of that. That's the greatest illustration of your growth and development is your players ownership. They are proud of what we have done. They have taken ownership in our program."

Jones ability to persuade players and their families to believe in what he is building at Tennessee is a large reason they are a factor with Smith, Akers and others.

"It's a people oriented business. There are a lot of great things to sale in our program. We didn't finish the way we wanted to finish. When you step back and that's what you have to do is take the emotion out of it and address everything where you are at. (Recruits) are excited about the future of Tennessee football and they want to be a part of it. That's been great."