Cunningham native, coaching novice tapped to lead UT

New field marshal Ryan Groves vows Vols ‘won’t suck so bad’ next year

KNOXVILLE – On a hallowed hill in Tennessee, the Volunteer Football program Monday night announced a surprise that echoed clear across the Smokies: coaching unknown Ryan Groves is taking the helm.

The floundering football Vols were expected to choose from a list of elite coaches to replace the rotund and resigning Phillip Fulmer.

But marquee names quickly became afterthoughts when UT Athletic Director Mike Hamilton went with an incredibly unconventional choice, hiring instead the state’s most proficient football video game player.

Groves recently emerged as champion of the Bluff City Xbox 360 NCAA Football ’09 Challenge. Using an unmatched display of strategic wit and dizzying quickness of thumb, Groves bested 441 others to win the tournament and its $250 prize. Little did he know the championship was also a one-way ticket to Rocky Top.

Hamilton was impressed and moved to recruit his surprise new coach.

“Why the hell not,” Hamilton said. “When you’re competing against the likes of Nick Saban, Urban Meyer and Mark Richt, I’m not sure even Lane Kiffen makes a hill of beans worth of difference. I want to kick off this rebuilding era with some young blood.”

A native of rural Cunningham, Tenn., Groves, 31, honed his video gaming skills during long hours of practice against college roommates during the Vols’ glory years of the 1990s and, more recently, against his own children ages 4 and 1.

Groves’ first measures of business as coach: Underperforming athletes will be strongly encouraged to heroically quit the team and to join the Armed Forces. A coach-and-players-only meeting will be held in December to discuss the players’ current and future life insurance policies.

“In life and on the gridiron, you never can be too insured,” Coach Groves stressed.

He wasted little time naming two Clarksville attorneys and coaching obscurities to the staff: Travis Meeks becomes offensive coordinator and B. Nathan Hunt is defensive coordinator.

Groves plans to begin recruiting next year’s team not along pipeline states but from within the university. He pointed out there are “way too many” 6-foot-11-inch, 320-pounders pursuing Biology majors instead of running sprints on the practice field.

“I can promise you we won’t suck so bad this time next year,” Groves said. “I’m committed to restoring the competitive-ism (sic) and dignity-ness (sic) of this football team.”

Volunteer football players were immediately impressed with Groves’ yelling ability and the distance which Hunt can angrily toss his hat.

Groves’ friends said the newly minted coach is best known for a few embarassing college blunders and for his devastating “people’s elbow” which he often delivered in drunken fits of rage. Groves once administered the move on little brother Patty “Doo-Doo” Groves, crushing the younger man’s tibia.

Groves’ wife, Christine instantly becomes the First Lady of Tennessee Football while their two young boys, Gracen and Grant, become the program’s top two blue chip prospects despite the fact neither can bench over 20 pounds and neither run the 40 meter dash in less than 25 seconds.

“That don’t (sic) matter,” Groves said. “We’re going to focus on the fundamentalists (sic).”

Christine, Groves’ unassuming wife only wanted to know, “When can we meet Coach (Bruce) Pearl?”

Hunt’s priority, in addition to leading the offense, will be to improve UT’s standing as the country’s 103rd best party school. He also aims to take under his wing players facing legal problems and those who seek guidance on talking pointlessly to hear themselves heard.

Meeks, reportedly on an “arm-and-leg” bender with his new wife in Aruba, could not be reached for comment.

Upon hearing the news Volunteer superfans Nathan Ledbetter, Matt Stokes, Chris Dennis, Evan Radish and Cecil Morgan shrugged and ripped into a 12-pack of Natural Light to celebrate.