Former Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley. Photo via Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football) on Twitter.
Former Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley is in the midst of his campaign for Senate in the state of Georgia and with the Republican primary in May, the election is beginning to heat up.
Recently, Dooley released an attack ad against the sitting Democratic Senator Jon Ossof. The former Tennessee football coach stood outside the Atlanta Braves stadium and discussed how in football “your film is your resume,” implying that Ossof is doing a poor job.
The comment from Dooley led to an attack ad against him from the official Democratic Party of Georgia, ridiculing Dooley’s failures as head coach at Tennessee with different soundbites from his time in Knoxville and even the painful ending to the 2010 LSU game.
“Why in the hell was Derek Dooley the hire?”
“Would he even be considered if his last name wasn’t Dooley? No!”
.@DerekDooleyGA said it best about his losing coaching record, “your film is your resume.” So let’s take a look at his film: pic.twitter.com/uP6cTBHYbj
— Georgia Democrats (@GeorgiaDemocrat) February 3, 2026
One of Dooley’s Republican challengers, Mike Collins, released an attack ad against Dooley over the summer criticizing the coach for always “staying on the sidelines.” The ad closes with three lines directed at Dooley— “never fights, never wins, never Trump.”
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Tennessee can attest to Derek Dooley never winning. The son of legendary Georgia head coach Vince Dooley, Derek spent three horrid seasons as Tennessee’s head coach from 2010-12. Perhaps the worst of the Vol football coaches in the dreadful stretch between Phillip Fulmer and Josh Heupel, Dooley led Tennessee to a 15-21 record.
The Vols failed to earn wins over SEC rivals Florida, Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina during Dooley’s tenure while also dropping a game each to Kentucky and Vanderbilt. Tennessee just once made a bowl game under Dooley, losing to North Carolina in the 2010 Music City Bowl.
After his time at Tennessee, Dooley spent five years as the Dallas Cowboys’ receivers coach before returning to college football as the offensive coordinator at Missouri for two years. Ironically, Dooley took over as Missouri’s offensive coordinator after Josh Heupel left to become the head coach at UCF.
Dooley returned to the NFL for two seasons as an assistant coach for the New York Giants before becoming an offensive analyst under Nick Saban at Alabama. Dooley was inside Neyland Stadium in 2022 when Tennessee ended its 15-game losing streak against the Crimson Tide.
The former Tennessee head coach did not coach during 2024 season or in 2025 after announcing his Senate campaign. and presumably moved back to his home state of Georgia where his father was a highly successful Bulldog head coach in the 1970s and 80s.