KNOXVILLE, TN – In an unprecedented move, the NCAA voted unanimously Monday to vacate the Division I Football National Championship that the University of Tennessee earned through the first four games of the regular season.

“This is a difficult decision for the NCAA,” said NCAA President D. Rick Dooley. “We know that the fans, who trumpeted to the world that the University of Tennessee had pretty much earned the National Championship because they weren’t publicly embarrassed in September for the first time in about sixty years, will be immensely disappointed.”

The University of Tennessee opened the season with four resounding September victories against Sun Belt Juggernaut Appalachian State, 1999 BCS Championship Runner-Up Virginia Tech, the Ohio University Bobcats (who still play football), and a Florida Gators squad that was without Tim Tebow.

October proved more difficult for the Volunteers, who required a Hail Mary to beat Georgia (you know, that team that just lost to Vanderbilt), and then lost consecutive games to Texas A&M and Alabama, who play in the SEC West, where good football isn’t against the law.

Tennessee fans hoped that a string of inconsequential victories in the first month of the season would be enough to keep their premature National Championship hopes alive, but apparently beating teams from the ACC, the MAC, the Sun Belt Conference, the SEC East, and the Monthaven League for the Blind is not enough to convince the NCAA to be as irrational as Jim Bob Vols Fan.

“We earned that trophy,” said Volunteers Head Coach Butch Jones. “It’s a shame to see these kids who worked so hard in the first month of the season have that trophy taken away just because we had to start playing real football teams.”

When asked for how the Volunteers planned to rally after being violently throttled by the University of Alabama, Coach Jones just stared into a fictional camera and said “Brick by Brick.”

“Also, have you seen the back half of this schedule?” Coach Jones added, with a laugh. “We play South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee Tech, Missouri, and Vanderbilt. We’ll see you in the SEC Championship Game.”