A new look and feel for 2024.
With Texas and Oklahoma joining the SEC in 2024, the SEC will do away with divisions. This creates a new dilemma for the league — how do you set the schedule? It’s no longer as easy as six divisional games and two out of division games.
The SEC will stick with eight conference games, but they were challenged with the task of preserving as many rivalries as possible while maintaining a competitive balance. The conference did that for Tennessee, keeping the in-state rivalry with Vanderbilt on the slate, as well as the Alabama, Florida and Georgia rivalries.
Here’s the full slate. No dates are set at this point.
Tennessee 2024 SEC Football Schedule
Home
Alabama
Florida
Kentucky
Mississippi State
Road
at Oklahoma
at Vanderbilt
at Arkansas
at Georgia
Tennessee’s 2024 Non-Conference Schedule
Chattanooga
N.C. State (Charlotte)
Kent State
UTEP
Quick Reaction
As expected, the Tennessee-Alabama series will continue, along with the Vanderbilt matchup. The other series in limbo were Kentucky, Georgia and Florida, which Tennessee will also keep on the schedule for 2024.
Tennessee will not play South Carolina or Missouri.
The typical challenges of Tennessee’s schedule are still there. They’ll have to face both Georgia and Alabama, as well as Florida. The next piece of the puzzle will be the when, which will be a big part of all of this.
The Volunteers will return to Norman for the first time since 2015. They’ll also host Mississippi State for the first time since 2019.
Overall, if you’re a traditionalist, you have to be satisfied with the SEC’s work here. It’ll be interesting to see if they stick to something like this going forward, or go to a nine-game schedule in 2025. All options are on the table for the future, but this is a nice band-aid to get us through 2024.