WRAL Sports Fan

North Carolina

UNC's Davis: 'I have no interest' in Tennessee

By Dane Huffman

Nov 12, 2008

Chapel Hill, N.C. — North Carolina football coach Butch Davis said again on Wednesday that he is not pursuing the head coaching position at Tennessee.

“I have absolutely no interest in the University of Tennessee job,” Davis said on the ACC’s weekly conference call. “It’s a great job, but I have no interest in it. I love being here. My family loves being at Carolina. With the administration, we‘re doing everything we can every single day to build a championship program here.”

Asked if his agent, Jimmy Sexton of Memphis, Tenn., had been contacted by Tennessee, Davis said, “No.”

Tennessee has pushed out longtime coach Phillip Fulmer, and Davis’ name has been mentioned prominently in speculation about the Volunteers’ next coach. Southeast Conference schools like Tennessee draw enormous crowds for football and usually pay much more than other colleges.

But Sexton said in a speech recently in Birmingham, Ala., that he expected Davis to remain at UNC. Davis is in his second season in Chapel Hill, and the Tar Heels are now contending for a berth in the ACC championship game.

Of course, big-time football coaches sometimes deny interest in jobs they eventually take. Nick Saban, for example, consistently said he would remain with the Miami Dolphins until he took a lucrative deal to coach Alabama.