Tennessee has never had a Heisman Trophy winner. For a program with six claimed national championships, sixteen conference titles and nearly 900 wins, that is the most conspicuous gap in college football, and it is not for lack of candidates. Four Volunteers have finished second, and the most famous of them, Peyton Manning in 1997, lost a vote that Knoxville has never accepted.
| Year | Player | Finish | Lost to |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1951 | Hank Lauricella, tailback | Second | Dick Kazmaier, Princeton |
| 1956 | Johnny Majors, tailback | Second | Paul Hornung, Notre Dame |
| 1993 | Heath Shuler, quarterback | Second | Charlie Ward, Florida State |
| 1997 | Peyton Manning, quarterback | Second | Charles Woodson, Michigan |
Peyton Manning, 1997
Manning returned for his senior season when he could have gone first overall in the NFL draft, threw for 3,819 yards and 36 touchdowns, won the SEC championship, and entered December as the overwhelming favourite. Charles Woodson, a Michigan cornerback who also returned punts and played some receiver, won by 272 points on the strength of an unbeaten Michigan season and a late surge in Midwest and East voting. He remains the only primarily defensive player to win the award.
Manning won the Maxwell, the Davey O’Brien and the Johnny Unitas awards that year, and Tennessee still holds that the vote was decided by geography rather than football. The number 16 is retired, and there is a street named for him next to the stadium.
Johnny Majors, 1956
Majors ran, passed, punted and returned kicks for a 10 and 1 team that won the SEC, and lost the vote to Paul Hornung of Notre Dame, who played on a 2 and 8 team. It remains the only time a Heisman has gone to a player from a losing side, and the 1956 vote is usually cited alongside 1997 as the two Tennessee grievances. Majors later coached the program for sixteen seasons. Our head coaches page covers that.
Hank Lauricella, 1951
Lauricella was the tailback in Neyland’s single wing on the 1951 national championship team and finished second to Dick Kazmaier of Princeton, in the era when Ivy League players were still regular contenders. His 75 yard run against Texas in the 1951 Cotton Bowl is the play the season is remembered for.
Heath Shuler, 1993
Shuler threw for 2,354 yards and 25 touchdowns as Tennessee went 9, 2 and 1 and finished second to Charlie Ward, whose Florida State team won the national championship. He went third overall in the NFL draft and later served three terms in Congress.
The Other Contenders
Tee Martin quarterbacked the 1998 champions without a top ten finish. Hendon Hooker was the favourite for much of 2022 before a knee injury in November ended his season. Reggie White, Al Wilson and John Henderson won every defensive award available and never figured in the Heisman vote because of the position they played. Our Heisman winners by year page has every recipient since 1995.
The Company Tennessee Keeps
Among the eleven programs with 850 or more wins, Tennessee is the only one without a Heisman winner. Every other founding power of the SEC has at least one: Alabama four, LSU three, Auburn three, Florida three, Georgia two. Tennessee’s four second place finishes are as many as Alabama has winners, which is the part of the record that suggests bad luck rather than a shortage of talent.
The Bottom Line
Tennessee has no Heisman Trophy winner and four runners up: Hank Lauricella in 1951, Johnny Majors in 1956, Heath Shuler in 1993 and Peyton Manning in 1997. Manning’s loss to Charles Woodson is the most disputed vote in the award’s modern history, and Majors’s loss to a player on a 2 and 8 team is the second. No program with as many wins, titles and All-Americans has gone as long without one.