Bob Shoop was one of the hottest names in the defensive coordinator market this offseason.

But that didn’t mean that the former Penn State coach could just walk in to Knoxville, hand over his completed job application and get to work.

Shoop told The Sports Animal in Knoxville that he went through a very extensive interview process with Vols head coach Butch Jones and other Tennessee officials.

CoachingSearch.com’s Chris Vannini published some of the comments made by Shoop during the interview.

On the interview process, which took 12 hours:

“It was pretty intense. The hardest part was I didn’t know anybody coming in here. I knew I was interested in the job, but I didn’t know any of the defensive coaches. I hadn’t met Coach Jones. I knew the personalities of the people through social media. I was probably more familiar with the players.

“I was anxious at first, but once I got in there and started talking football, it reinvigorated me. I wouldn’t have taken the job if I felt any other way. At the end of the day, Strip, Thig and Willie, we hit it off well, and there’s great chemistry.”

Though he did not know Jones prior to the meeting, things seemed to have gone pretty well:

“Coach Jones and I talked about this after I spent the day here. We both used the word ‘invigorating. Sometimes, when you’ve been with a group of people for so long, the positive is the routine, but the negative is the routine. To talk football and hear a different way of doing things, from the way the team practiced to the scheme to the terminology, that was really cool.”

Given that Shoop had been coaching alongside James Franklin since arriving at Vanderbilt in 2011, and Jones had coached with former Vols defensive coordinator John Jancek for quite some time as well, that’s a pretty telling exchange.

Shoop will take over a Vols defense that returns playmakers CB Cam Sutton and LB Jalen Reeves-Maybin, who both turned down a chance to leave early for the NFL Draft to play their final seasons at Tennessee.