Vols to Face Carolina in Nashville's Music City Bowl Thursday, Dec. 30

After flirting with the opportunity to go to Florida on New Year's Day, it appears Tennessee's football team will be staying in-state after all with a trip from Knoxville to Nashville later this month to play the North Carolina Tar Heels in the Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowl on ESPN.

The 6-6 Vols were a long-shot to make it to the Gator Bowl, an SEC slot that has apparently been filled by Mississippi State, who will face Michigan.

Derek Dooley's Volunteers finished strong, winning their last four games straight to end the season, after starting out 2-6 in the beginning. The matchup with UNC could very well be a good draw for the holiday season.

Ironically, it was North Carolina that UT athletics director Mike Hamilton dropped from the Tennessee schedule for 2011 and 2012, a home and home series that was to have renewed the rivalry that was so popular in the days of General Neyland.

The Vols and Tar Heels first faced off way back in 1893 in Chapel Hill and have played each other a total of 31 times, with Tennessee winning 20 of those. Their last meeting was in Knoxville in 1961. The teams had played each other annually since World War II, from 1945 to 1961, when the popular series was inexplicably cancelled upon General Neyland's retirement as UT's athletics director and subsequent death.

The matchup should be a good one. Butch Davis' 7-5 Carolina team will be playing in its third consecutive bowl game. Tennessee will be playing in its second in a row and its 49th all-time, the third most in college football.

Due to Southern Cal's NCAA probation and ineligibility for bowls, Tennessee has now overtaken them in bowl appearances under Dooley. Texas is one bowl invitation ahead of the Vols at second nationally with 50, and Alabama has played in more bowls than anyone, with their 58th invitation this season.