Tennessee’s Jones on hottest of seats

Tennessee coach Butch Jones says he isn’t allowing questions about his precarious job status to distract him as he prepares for the toughest challenge of his five-year tenure.

The Volunteers (3-3, 0-3 SEC) haven’t scored a touchdown in its past 10 quarters and have dropped three of their past four games.

Now they must prepare for a Saturday game at No. 1 Alabama (7-0, 4-0).

Tennessee’s failures in SEC competition have turned up the pressure on Jones, who owns a 33-24 overall record but has lost seven of his past nine league games.

“I don’t worry about any of that,” Jones said. “All my focus is on our players and our football program and getting them ready for the Alabama game.”

Alabama has beaten rival Tennessee 10 times in a row and is a whopping 34½-point favorite this time.

Clemson

Coach Dabo Swinney already has started breaking down every aspect of his program since the seventhranked Tigers’ surprise loss to Syracuse Friday night. “It’s been a long weekend,” Swinney said Monday. Clemson (6-1, 4-1 ACC) is off this week before playing host Oct. 28 to Georgia Tech. “The bottom line is we really did a poor job. We really did a poor job as coaches,” Swinney said. “Flat out got our butts kicked.”

Washington State

Coach Mike Leach said he was as surprised as anyone when he learned athletic director Bill Moos had taken a new job at Nebraska. But Leach said he has no plans to follow Moos, noting Nebraska already has Mike Riley to lead their football program. Some Cougars fans have expressed concern that Moos may try to lure Leach away to Nebraska. “I wish Bill the best and we just move forward,” Leach said.