The Tennessee Volunteers and Lady Volunteers are the 20 male and female varsity intercollegiate athletics programs that represent the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Volunteers compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) as a member of the Southeastern Conference (SEC). In January 2021, Danny White was introduced as the Volunteers' Director of Athletics.
Rowing is the oldest intercollegiate sport in the United States. The first intercollegiate race was a contest between Yale and Harvard in 1852. In the 2018–19 school year, there were 2,340 male and 7,294 female collegiate rowers in Divisions I, II and III, according to the NCAA. The sport has grown since the first NCAA statistics were compiled for the 1981–82 school year, which reflected 2,053 male and 1,187 female collegiate rowers in the three divisions. Some concern has been raised that some recent female numbers are inflated by non-competing novices.
The Los Gatos Rowing Club was started in 1979 to provide what was then mostly an eastern U.S. sport, to the kids in the Santa Clara Valley. In the past 20 years, more than 2,000 kids from 15 different high schools have passed through the program. Many have gone onto colleges and universities to row competitively, several have received rowing scholarships, and a few have been selected for Junior National Camps and are trying for the Olympics.
The Tennessee Volunteers men's basketball team is the collegiate men's basketball program for the University of Tennessee–Knoxville. The Volunteers compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The Volunteers play their home games in Thompson–Boling Arena, on a court nicknamed "the Summitt", after former Tennessee Lady Vols basketball coach Pat Summitt. With a current capacity of 21,678, Tennessee has consistently ranked in the top 15 in the nation in terms of volume of attendance, averaging 14,817 attendance from 1988 through 2006, and averaging 17,194 attendance from 2007 through 2018 after reducing seating capacity prior to the 2007 season. Historically, Tennessee ranks third in the SEC in all-time wins. Many notable players have played collegiately at Tennessee—players such as Bernard King, Dale Ellis, Allan Houston, Tobias Harris, and Grant Williams who all play(ed) in the NBA. Chris Lofton, Ron Slay, Tyler Smith, and John Fulkerson are also notable players who later played professionally in other leagues.
Caryn Davies is an American rower. She is the winner of the 2023 Thomas Keller Medal, the most prestigious international award in the sport of rowing, and the only American to have ever won this award. She won gold medals as the stroke seat of the U.S. women's eight at the 2012 Summer Olympics and the 2008 Summer Olympics. In April 2015 Davies stroked Oxford University to victory in the first ever women's Oxford/Cambridge boat race held on the same stretch of the river Thames in London where the men's Oxford/Cambridge race has been held since 1829. She was the most highly decorated Olympian to take part in either [men's or women's] race. In 2012 Davies was ranked number 4 in the world by the International Rowing Federation. At the 2004 Olympic Games she won a silver medal in the women's eight. Davies has won more Olympic medals than any other U.S. oarswoman. The 2008 U.S. women's eight, of which she was a part, was named FISA crew of the year. Davies is from Ithaca, New York, where she graduated from Ithaca High School, and rowed with the Cascadilla Boat Club. Davies was on the Radcliffe College (Harvard) Crew Team and was a member on Radcliffe's 2003 NCAA champion Varsity 8, and overall team champion. In 2013, she was a visiting student at Pembroke College, Oxford, where she stroked the college men's eight to a victory in both Torpids and the Oxford University Summer Eights races. In 2013–14 Davies took up Polynesian outrigger canoeing in Hawaii, winning the State novice championship and placing 4th in the long-distance race na-wahine-o-ke-kai with her team from the Outrigger Canoe Club. In 2013, she was inducted into the New York Athletic Club Hall of Fame and in 2022 into the Harvard University Athletics Hall of Fame.
Megan Cooke Carcagno is an American rower. She was a gold medalist at the 2006 World Rowing Cup and a gold medalist at the 2006 FISA World Rowing Championships, assisting in setting a world best time for the U.S. National Team. She was also a 2006 champion at the Henley Royal Regatta and the Head of the Charles Regatta.
Yasmin Farooq is an American rowing cox and the head coach of the University of Washington women's rowing team. She graduated from Waupun High School in 1984 at Waupun, Wisconsin. She attended the University of Wisconsin where she joined the rowing team in 1984 as a coxswain. She was a member of the 1986 national champion JV eight and served as captain and MVP of the team her senior year. A two-time Olympian and world champion in rowing, Farooq later became a college coach at Stanford University where she helped the Cardinal win its first ever Pac-12 and NCAA titles in rowing. At the University of Washington, her team swept the NCAA Championship for the first-time in history, then repeated the feat in 2019 setting NCAA records in all three events. She has been named Pac-12 coach of the year six times and national coach of the year three times. She was inducted into the USRowing Hall of Fame in 2014 and awarded the Ernestine Bayer Woman of the Year award by USRowing in 2017. In 2021, Farooq was inducted into the Wisconsin Athletics Hall of Fame.
The Tennessee Lady Volunteers softball team represents the University of Tennessee (UT) in Knoxville, Tennessee in NCAA Division I women's softball competition. Coached by Karen Weekly, the team has become a consistently top-tier team in the Southeastern Conference (SEC), appearing in every NCAA tournament since 2004, and qualifying for 8 Women's College World Series.
The Tennessee Lady Volunteers volleyball team represents the University of Tennessee located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Volunteers compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The Volunteers play their home matches in the Thompson–Boling Arena on the university's campus, and are currently led by 3rd-year head coach Eve Rackham.
The Tennessee Volunteers cross country program represents the University of Tennessee located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The men's program competes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The men's cross country team officially started in 1924.
The Tennessee Lady Volunteers cross country program represents the University of Tennessee (UT) located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The women's program competes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The women's cross country team officially started in 1974.
The Tennessee Volunteers men's Swimming and Diving program represents the University of Tennessee located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Volunteers are currently coached by Matt Kredich. The Vols host their swim meets in the Allan Jones Intercollegiate Aquatic Center which was newly built in 2008. The Vols compete in the SEC where they have won 10 SEC team titles, 173 individual titles and 45 relay crowns. Over the past 75 years of competition the Vols have produced numerous All-Americans, 24 Olympians, scored in 53 consecutive NCAA Championship meets, won 45 individual NCAA titles and won 1 NCAA National Title.
The Tennessee Lady Volunteers soccer team represents the University of Tennessee (UT) in Knoxville, Tennessee in NCAA Division I women's soccer competition as a member of the Southeastern Conference (SEC).
Simon Carcagno is an American rower who competed in lightweight rowing. He won a gold medal in the eights at the 2008 World Rowing Championships and placed third in the coxless pairs in 2003. He also won a silver medal in the coxless fours at the 2007 Pan American Games. He represented the United States as an alternate at the 2004 Summer Olympics and the 2008 Summer Olympics.
The Tennessee Volunteer men's tennis team represents the University of Tennessee, in Knoxville, TN. The program has appeared in 31 NCAA Tournaments. Additionally, the Vols have won 9 SEC Championships, 4 SEC Tournaments, and finished as national runner-up three times. Prominent ATP players who came to Tennessee include Tennys Sandgren, John-Patrick Smith, Chris Woodruff, Paul Annacone, Michael Fancutt, and Mike De Palmer.
The Tennessee Volunteers women's golf team represents the University of Tennessee located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Vols compete at the Division I level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The Vols currently rotate between 16 different golf courses located in the state of Tennessee. The current coach for the Lady Volunteer's is Diana Cantu who began in 2022. Until the 2022 season, the Lady Vols had appeared in an NCAA regional every year since the program began in 1993, and they were one of only 9 NCAA Division 1 teams to compete in every NCAA regional since the championship’s format was established. Overall the Lady Vols have competed in 29 NCAA Regionals and 14 NCAA Championships.
Madison Shipman is an American former professional softball player. She played college softball at Tennessee.
Regina SalmonsOLY is an American rower and two-time Olympian. She competed in the women's eight event at the 2020 Summer Olympics and the women’s eight event at the 2024 Summer Olympics. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2018, where she earned honors for her thesis in creative writing and served as editor-in-chief of a feminist literary magazine on campus.
The Tennessee Volunteers women's Swimming and Diving program represents the University of Tennessee located in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Volunteers are currently coached by Matt Kredich. The Lady Vols host their swim home meets in Allan Jones Intercollegiate Aquatic Center which was newly built in 2008. The Lady compete in the SEC where they have won 2 SEC team titles, 84 individual, relay, and diving titles. Additionally, the program is one of only 3 that have scored in all 41 NCAA meets, and it has produced 8 NCAA individual and relay titles, 16 Olympians, and 3 Olympic medalists.
The Tennessee Lady Volunteers women's tennis team represents the University of Tennessee, in Knoxville, TN. The program has qualified for 31 NCAA Tournaments, including 20 straight from 1995 to 2014. They are led by former player and current 8th year head coach Alison Ojeda.
