Where ESPN's Football Power Index ranks Tennessee Football's strength of schedule
Tennessee Football will play the eighth toughest schedule in college football this season, according to ESPN’s Football Power Index. It’s all SEC teams in front of the Vols, too, with Florida having the No. 1 strength of schedule, ahead of Mississippi State, Georgia, Kentucky, Auburn, Alabama and Oklahoma.
The FPI has Tennessee ranked No. 9 overall with a projected win-loss of 8.6-3.5. The FPI gives the Vols a 95.4% chance to win at least six games, a 5.5% chance to win the SEC, a 36.9% chance to make the 12-team College Football Playoff, a 6.0% chance to make the national championship game and a 2.7% chance to win the national title.
Tennessee, ranked No. 15 in the US LBM Preseason Coaches Poll, plays four ranked teams as of the poll’s release: No. 1 Georgia, No. 5 Alabama, No. 16 Oklahoma and No. 22 North Carolina State. Kentucky (12) and Florida (11) received votes in the poll but were not ranked.
Florida’s No. 1-ranked schedule ends with five straight teams ranked in the Preseason Coaches Poll, including four top-10 teams. The Gators close with No. 1 Georgia, a trip to No. 4 Texas, home games against No. 12 LSU and No. 6 Ole Miss then end the regular season at No. 10 Florida State.
Tennessee Football’s 2024 Schedule
Tennessee opens the season against Chattanooga on August 31 and faces North Carolina State on September 7 in Charlotte.
After hosting Kent State on September 14, the Vols open SEC play with road games at Oklahoma (September 21) and at Arkansas (October 5).
Tennessee hosts Florida and Alabama back-to-back on October 12 and October 19, respectively, then has home games against Kentucky (November 2) and Mississippi State (November 9) before going to Georgia on November 16.
The regular season closes with the home finale against UTEP on November 23, then a trip to Vanderbilt on November 30.
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Kickoff times for the Vols this season
The opener against Chattanooga will be a 12:45 p.m. Eastern Time start on SEC Network and the North Carolina State game a week later will be in primetime, scheduled for 7:30 p.m. ET on ABC.
The Kent State game will be a 7:45 p.m. ET start on SEC Network and the UTEP game on November 23 will be a 1 p.m. ET start and will stream on SEC Network+/ESPN+.
Kickoff windows — specific start times will be announced later in the year — have been set for the other eight games on schedule.
The regular-season finale at Vanderbilt on November 30 will be an early kickoff, between Noon-1 p.m. ET. Kentucky on November 2 and Mississippi State on November 9 will be night games, kicking off somewhere between 6-8 p.m. ET.
The other six games are set for flex times, kicking off either between 3:30-4:30 p.m. ET or 6-8 p.m. ET: at Oklahoma, at Arkansas, Florida, Alabama and at Georgia.
