About 24 hours after he was officially eliminated from winning a third consecutive East title, Jim McElwain got fired by Florida.

Despite coming to Gainesville with a reputation as a sound offensive mind, McElwain scored even fewer points per game during his reign than the defensive-minded guy he replaced, Will Muschamp. The Gators average a pathetic 21.3 points in 2017.

In the end, not only did McElwain fail to win enough games at UF, but he didn’t win them the right way. When Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer were winning national championships, each scored a ton of style points, too. When you pair McElwain’s failures with his odd personality and flippant behavior, administrators and boosters soured on him quickly.

Somehow, Butch Jones still has his job at Tennessee. Even a few weeks ago, nobody saw McElwain getting pink-slipped first.

The Volunteers lost their fifth conference game Saturday in five tries, as they continue to be tied at the bottom of the division alongside similarly winless Missouri and Vanderbilt. This time it was Kentucky with a last-minute dagger.

Jones was supposedly coaching for his job in the Georgia game. There he was the following Monday. He was supposedly coaching for his job in the South Carolina game, too. Again, there he was the following Monday — even with a bye on the schedule. With seven extra days to get ready, he got annihilated at Alabama before the heartbreaker at Kentucky.

Here we are, another Monday starting off another week, and Jones is still wearing a whistle around his neck. Rocky Top is howling.

On the field, the Vols have been a total mess. Quinten Dormady and Jarrett Guarantano have a combined passer efficiency rating of 115.8, which is 13th in the league. The defense is 10th in yards allowed per game and ninth in points allowed.

But off the field, it’s even worse. John Kelly, the team’s lone standout performer, was suspended for this past week after getting picked up for marijuana possession. There have been rumors about infighting among both players and coaches. When Jones isn’t throwing out preposterous clichés — “leadership reps” is the latest one — he’s gone to war with fans and media alike.

For whatever reason, Tennessee has employed a death-by-a-thousand-cuts approach with Jones.

Florida saw its situation going from bad to worse, so athletic director Scott Stricklin acted quickly and cut off McElwain’s proverbial head.

Beyond a six-game stretch with the now-transferred Will Grier in 2015, the Gators have shuffled equally mediocre quarterbacks up and down the depth chart. Treon Harris, Luke Del Rio, Austin Appleby, Feleipe Franks, Malik Zaire … ugh.

Away from the gridiron, McElwain seemed to be a bad fit for UF. Yes, he was a disciple of Nick Saban and won two rings as his offensive coordinator at Alabama, but he was far from an SEC lifer. He was a Montana native whose only head-coaching experience came at Colorado State. A strong argument can be made that the job was too big for him.

For whatever reason, Tennessee has employed a death-by-a-thousand-cuts approach with Jones. Most everyone is stunned that he hasn’t been axed yet.

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Jones was even more unfamiliar with the twisted inner workings of this admittedly crazy conference than McElwain. Born in Michigan, the only Power 5 programs where he had experience as an assistant were Rutgers and West Virginia.

He did some real commendable stuff previously as a head coach, though. Jones won 27 games in three seasons at Central Michigan and then 19 in his last two years at Cincinnati before getting the big-stage opportunity with the Volunteers. Just like before at Central Michigan and Cincinnati, he looked to have things pointed in the right direction by Year 2 or 3.

Tennessee has continued to let Jones twist in the wind to the point where the entire school is a laughingstock. Everybody knows that there's no way he'll return, so the face of the team is a glorified punching bag right now.

Five wins in 2013, seven in 2014 and then nine in 2015. By 2016, UT had the makings of the team to beat in the East.

However, it didn’t happen. There was losses to West foes Texas A&M and Alabama, which were both in the Top 10 at the time, but defeats to unranked South Carolina and Vanderbilt were inexcusable. There were injuries, you say? Every team has those.

Expectations were reasonably low for this season, yet the Vols have still been a colossal disappointment. The offense can’t score. The defense can’t pick up the slack. The special teams have been average in every phase. Negativity in Knoxville is as rampant as the valleys of the three-year Derek Dooley disaster from 2010-12.

While there were tremors here and there about McElwain being a square peg in a round hole, Florida didn’t let things get out of hand.

Conversely, Tennessee has continued to let Jones twist in the wind to the point where the entire school is a laughingstock. Everybody knows that there’s no way he’ll return, so the face of the team is a glorified punching bag right now.

With an early signing period implemented for the class of 2018, nobody is sure what to expect on the recruiting trail when it comes to coaching vacancies — both real and imagined. According to 247Sports, the Gators rank seventh ahead of National Signing Day. The Volunteers are 11th, but they were sixth before a recent rash of decommitments.

UF is a Top 10 job in America and will have plenty of interested parties. Speculation has been widespread since McElwain’s ouster.

UT may not be a Top 10 job, but it’s certainly Top 20. The Volunteer State isn’t Mecca for high school football talent like the Sunshine State is, although money won’t be an issue, the facilities are outstanding and the fan base is hungry.

Behind the scenes, surely overtures are being made to the likes of Jon Gruden and Chip Kelly — even with Jones preparing for Southern Miss on Saturday. Nevertheless, the Vols are dealing with public-relations nightmares like #EmptyNeyland because they’ve chosen to draw out the inevitable decision to let Jones go.

Florida treated McElwain like an old band-aid and ripped him right off. Tennessee is masochistically pulling out hairs one at a time.