If you’d told me 10 years ago the Tennessee Volunteers could finish a season 6-6 and consider it a success, I’d have slapped you right in the face.

My how the times have changed.

If Tennessee defeats Vanderbilt on Saturday, and it should, it will close the regular season with a 6-6 record and by the skin of its teeth earn bowl eligibility. And you can absolutely consider the achievement a success.

You see, Tennessee didn’t regress to this level, it actually rose to it. Sure that’s a testament to just how far this program fell from grace, but it’s also a testament to the positive direction this program is headed in Year 2 of the Butch Jones era.

Jones took over the program at its lowest point in a generation and rebuilt it “brick by brick” in the toughest conference in the country. That Lane Kiffin debacle could have happened to anyone, and the Derek Dooley experiment in its aftermath obviously failed.

That was hard to come back from, and yet Tennessee has in the span of just two years. His team is poised to win its third SEC game of the year on Saturday and reach the postseason for the first time since 2010. It has an emerging star at quarterback in a division lacking star power at the position, and Jones remains a dynamite recruiter who has already begun stockpiling talent at the skill positions.

Other falling titans like Texas, Michigan and Florida faced far less adversity to end up worse off than Tennessee. None of the four programs would call the current season one of its best-ever, but only Tennessee is trending in a positive direction among them.

And while reaching a bowl game is a proud accomplishment, the game itself also has plenty of perks that UT could consider a step toward success. Tennessee’s young core will get an extra three weeks to practice together, and the program will get to take center stage some night in December and gain the national exposure that comes with being in a bowl game.

Future recruits and current boosters will be able to watch Tennessee put its season on the line and perhaps even clinch its first winning season since 2009. Earning that exposure is certainly a success.

If Tennessee plateaus at 6-6 for the next handful of seasons, it will stop being considered a success in a hurry. This season can only be considered a success if its a stepping stone on the path to the power Tennessee once held in the SEC.

For now, it is absolutely a success, which, again, is as much a testament to how far UT fell as it is to how far back its climbed. The trend is positive, and for a rebuilding program that’s all that matters.