As long as it meant he could play the game, David Cutcliffe wasn't above a little petty theft when he was a child.

For as long as he can remember, happiness has always gone hand in hand with "the game" for Tennessee's offensive coordinator.

"I hated to lose," he said. "I despise it still."

About 40 years ago in Birmingham, Ala., Cutcliffe and some neighborhood buddies formed a team called the Lawson Road Bombers.

The sole purpose was competition.

They would play rival neighborhood teams any time, any place, in any sport.

If it meant stealing home plate and a pitching rubber from a baseball complex so they could have their own field of dreams in a nearby pasture - so be it.

"I got in trouble with my parents," Cutcliffe said. "I mean it was intense.

"I had problems with it. Fights."

Losing was unthinkable.

"My dad was like that as a competitor," Cutcliffe said. "As a kid, I would pitch a fit and break stuff. I got in trouble throwing rocks at people.

"I love it. I feel most alive when I'm competing."

That's why Cutcliffe feels most alive right now.

Besides being thankful to "just be on God's green earth," he's in the coaching fold once again.

He feels like he's home.

After a seven-year absence, Cutcliffe is back in his sparsely decorated corner office of the Neyland-Thompson indoor practice facility.

He's healthier, 30 pounds lighter and just as hungry for success at UT.

THE NEW OUTLOOK Triple-bypass surgery and a year away from the game he loves changed Cutcliffe.

It didn't change his desire to be the best. It just changed his outlook.

Cutcliffe withstood a stressful firing as Ole Miss head coach after a 4-7 season in 2004.

The dismissal came with three years remaining on his contract and a career record of 44-29 in six seasons at Oxford. The Rebels went to five bowl games, including a Cotton Bowl victory against Oklahoma State.

Still, Cutcliffe didn't stay bitter or unemployed for long.

"I saw that we survived it," he said. "My family survived it.

"We're pretty tough. The Cutcliffes are pretty tough."

Charlie Weis of Notre Dame came calling in search of a quarterback coach and Cutcliffe was entrenched with the Irish offense when his health began to falter.

He underwent the triple bypass on March 9, 2005, and stepped away from South Bend, Ind., to focus on his recovery.

Thoughts soon turned to Knoxville. It had been his home as an assistant coach at UT from 1982-98. He and wife Karen agreed it was time to load up the family and move back to East Tennessee.

"I'd say the biggest difference is I think about everything I do now," Cutcliffe said of his new focus on work and life. "I really enjoy a family meal."

More than anything else, he senses a renewed enthusiasm is coupled with a twinge of mellowing.

"I'm probably more energetic and more enthusiastic," he said. "But I try not to get nearly as uptight or upset.

"I can still be impatient, particularly on the practice field. I don't think that's going to change. But I'm not going to let every little thing bother me near as much as it used to."

THE FAMILY MAN Cutcliffe, who turns 52 when UT plays Florida - Sept. 16 - makes it clear his family is the reason he made it through the tough times.

Karen, a Harriman native and UT graduate, expressed concern when her husband announced he was returning to the high-stress world of SEC football.

"I'm glad she's concerned," Cutcliffe said. "That's better than her not giving a heck whether I'm there.

"We make the most out of the little time we have together now. She loves being a part of this Tennessee family. She missed Tennessee. There's no doubt."

The Cutcliffe's have three children: Chris, Katie and Emily. They also have a newly adopted family member, UT sophomore Marcus Hilliard.

"Marcus joined our family in Oxford," Cutcliffe said. "We were taking Chris to middle school. He was midway through the sixth grade when we went to Oxford.

"Marcus met us there and said to Chris, 'Hey, are you a new kid?' That's the way we were introduced to Marcus. He took Chris off to class and they became really good friends."

Karen also befriended Marcus' mother.

"His mother came down with cancer and passed away," Cutcliffe said. "It was a really quick bout with cancer and Marcus was left without family - so he moved in with us.

"It has been hard on him and it's a big change. All of a sudden we move to Tennessee.

"One of the biggest thrills of his life was being admitted here to the University of Tennessee."

Chris and Marcus are working as team managers with the Vols.

"Marcus is just a tremendous young man and I think he feels like he has a brother and two sisters in Chris and Katie and Emily," Cutcliffe said.

Undertaking a new addition to the family was simply instinct.

"Our lives have been about young people, our own and others," Cutcliffe said. "That's just kind of a natural thing.

"I got into coaching, and Karen's a teacher. You do those things because you want to work with young people."

In their own way, it was the children who helped keep Cutcliffe sane and surviving his one-year sabbatical from coaching.

He actually enjoyed sitting on the couch for a while and having an "American Idol" party.

"My perspective changed," he said. "I wanted to be the best daddy and teach my 5-year-old how to ride a bike.

"I wanted to share kindergarten with her, and junior year with Katie, share the freshman year in college with Marcus and Chris, share a life with my wife being back here with her family. I was so consumed in all of that."

THE MEMORIES Cutcliffe's first memories of Tennessee are of a near penniless existence as a 26-year-old part-time assistant to then-coach Johnny Majors in the early 1980s.

He had been a successful head coach at his alma mater, Banks High School in Birmingham.

Being a hotshot young coach in Alabama, Cutcliffe did the most natural, impulsive thing he could think of after a 10-0 season.

"I didn't really have anything when I was kid, and a guy who drove a Cadillac was a big-time rich guy," he said. "So when I had a little success, I was single and had a little money in my pocket, I bought me a Cadillac."

Then came a bass boat. Then came a call from Tennessee.

Bye, bye Cadillac and bass boat. Hello poverty and 90-hour work weeks.

"I came up here and lived in the dorm at Gibbs Hall on the fourth floor with the freshmen," Cutcliffe said. "I didn't have any money so I had to sell my Cadillac and buy a Toyota Corolla hatchback.

"I had to have that money just to survive, to live, to eat and pay my insurance."

The next year, changed NCAA regulations allowed nine assistant coaches instead of eight, and Cutcliffe became UT's first ninth assistant.

"Thank goodness it worked out," he said. "You talk about lucky."

From there, Cutcliffe developed a close friendship with another UT assistant.

Phillip Fulmer was offensive line coach for the Vols and quickly hit it off with the newcomer from Alabama.

"He's a fantastic friend," Fulmer said. "Just a great person."

Together, they gradually climbed UT's coaching ladder.

Fulmer became head coach and Cutcliffe became his offensive coordinator in 1993. The next six years became one of the most successful stints in Tennessee football history.

"I was never a superstar at anything," Cutcliffe said. "I was a guy who just went along step-by-step trying to improve myself. That's a good way to make it.

"I absolutely would not change a thing."

THE PAIN OF 2005 Cutcliffe chalks last season up as just another learning experience.

He spent more time with his family, but there was no denying he missed football.

That fact hit him hard when he rode the elevator up to the Neyland Stadium press box as a fan instead of a coach during UT's 2005 season opener.

"The first time I went to the UAB game, sitting up in the press box during pre-game warm-ups, it ate me up," Cutcliffe said. "I went into my world and didn't like it at all.

"I knew I was in the wrong place not doing what I was supposed to do. It was tough to watch."

Soon, the entire 2005 Tennessee season became tough to watch.

Cutcliffe looked on from a distance as his old coaching friends struggled through a 5-6 season, primarily because of offensive inefficiency.

"It was really hard," he said. "There were a lot of late nights and talking to guys over here.

"You know what they're going through and words aren't going help a whole lot. Things can slip away from you so easily. It's slippery and it's not easy to manage those tough times."

Cutcliffe speaks from experience.

He had walked in Fulmer's shoes during his final season at Ole Miss.

He had heard the jeers and taunts, just as former UT offensive coordinator Randy Sanders heard last season.

"You still have to get up and go to work with the same passion and the same energy," he said. "Your wife still has to go to the grocery store and overhear what they're saying.

"They probably have it worse. Kids still have to go to school and hear what the other kids are saying."

You just keep going.

Cutcliffe managed to maintain a distant tie to football as a regular guest on Knoxville radio shows.

"To be honest with you, I enjoyed the radio work," he said. "That really gave me a fix. I enjoyed the people and that gave me a different perspective.

"That opened my eyes to some things and I consider that a real positive experience."

THE TYPICAL DAY When Sanders resigned last November, Cutcliffe was the no-brainer fit to return to the UT fold.

He definitely had the endorsement of another pretty well known father.

Archie Manning went public with the fact he was ashamed by Cutcliffe's firing at Ole Miss.

The Rebels' legend had watched Cutcliffe help mold his sons, Peyton and Eli, into quarterback superstars at Tennessee and Mississippi, respectively.

"You can be the daddy and let Cut do the coaching," Archie said after Cutcliffe was rehired by UT in November. "Just take a good seat, watch it and enjoy it."

A reenergized Cutcliffe didn't waste any time diving into his rebuilding effort.

He met with UT's returning offensive players and told them to buckle up, they were about to get a big dose of Cutcliffe 101.

It's a non-stop approach full of high expectations.

"I get here about 5:30 and get a workout in until about 6:30," Cutcliffe said. "I start work about 6:45 and during the season, we'll work all day."

Cutcliffe usually brown bags a lunch and never stops working.

"Depending on whether you've got a recruiting night or a game-plan night - Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, I'm going to get home about 11 p.m.," he said. "Thursday, if I'm ahead of the game, I will have done the game plan and completed it on paper, typed and ready to study, so I like to try to eat dinner with my family.

"I might make a couple of recruiting calls, but I enjoy just a little bit of a mental break on Thursday."

Big-time coaches understand that's the nature of the game.

Cutcliffe doesn't think the average, every day UT fan has any idea how much time is spent trying to mold a winning, nationally elite program in the SEC.

"They would be surprised if they followed you around," he said. "There's a whole lot of people in this world who work hard, but I don't know that anybody keeps the schedule we do.

"It's constant. You get an open date and thank goodness you get a chance to catch your breath."

Cutcliffe hasn't even had time to hang pictures on his office walls, but that's coming.

"I want to get my pictures up and get my quarterbacks up on the wall," he said. "I want to make it look good and give it a comfortable feeling. That helps in recruiting."

So do pictures of Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Heath Shuler, Tee Martin and Andy Kelly, all quarterbacks who flourished under Cutcliffe.

THE SEASON AT HAND Tennessee junior quarterback Erik Ainge is Cutcliffe's latest project.

Ainge followed a freshman season full of dazzling moments with a befuddling sophomore campaign marred by shaky decisions and confidence issues.

All that is changing, according to Ainge.

"We're all excited," he said. "Every time Coach Cutcliffe gets fired up and starts giving a coach Cut speech, everybody is on the edge of their seats and they're listening.

"Everyone respects him. They know what he has done. Coach Cutcliffe will tell you he didn't come back to Tennessee to get his guru card. People know he knows what he's doing. That's not a debate."

Cutcliffe made it clear to the Vols from the first meeting on that he refuses to fail.

It goes back to his Lawson Road Bomber days.

"Coach Cutcliffe came back to do what we need to do to win every football game we play," Ainge said. "That's our attitude.

"We have this offensive philosophy and a mission statement. At the end of it, it says, 'Find a way to win.' That's what it's all about."

And that's what Cutcliffe is all about.

He hasn't soft pedaled his expectations to UT's offense, especially Ainge.

"He's a talented football player and I think everybody has seen that," Cutcliffe said. "At this stage, what he has to do is make the plays within the system.

"I can't crawl inside his head. I don't know what he's thinking, but let's face it, he went through what he went through a year ago at 19 years old. Does that affect you? You're darn right it does."

Cutcliffe takes his teaching one five-step drop, one seven-on-seven drill and one practice at a time. His motto is "perfect the little stuff" and the big picture will soon come into focus.

Admittedly, it's a work in progress, but Cutcliffe has the resume to back up his methods.

In 1993, his first as offensive coordinator at UT, the Vols led the SEC in scoring and finished second in the nation with 42.8 points per game.

His goal every year is to score at least 30 points a game. UT teams accomplished that all six years during his previous stint, leading the SEC in total offense twice.

Last season, the Vols averaged 18.6 points a game, good for 102nd in the nation.

Cutcliffe settled in immediately with Fulmer and defensive coordinator John Chavis, almost like he'd never left.

There's a mutual respect among all three that is undeniable.

Cutcliffe marvels at Fulmer's ability to manage all aspects of a program.

"He's unbelievable," Cutcliffe said. "He's so committed to this.

"I've been in his shoes, so I know how hard it is when you're dealing with academics, and dealing with discipline, and recruiting and the media.

"He manages multi-tasking better than anybody I've ever been around."

In Chavis, he finds a kindred spirit with a similar intensity and similar disgust with failure.

"He's going to be mad, and cranked up, and his intensity level is going to be cranked up," Cutcliffe said. "He's competing for every inch.

"That's what I want our offense to be like. I want our offense to compete for an inch. We can all take a lesson from John Chavis."

The next step comes when ninth-ranked California visits Neyland Stadium for the season opener on Sept. 2.

Cutcliffe can't wait.

He lives for those game days. This time he'll settle into a familiar seat, in a familiar booth and try to produce familiar results.

"It'll be fun and I'll have butterflies," he said. "I'll be taping stuff up on the window so the wives aren't staring at you after you call a play.

"No offense to the wives, but I'll have myself covered up pretty good with 2-point charts, depth charts, and reminders. I don't want to be distracted."

THE FUTURE For Cutcliffe, the future is the next practice.

It's the next call and the next game.

The future is putting his play sheets together and the focus of his next offensive team meeting.

"We're trying to win football games," he said. "The total focus is on our team and what we have to do to win football games."

Like Ainge said, Cutcliffe is way past trying to earn his "guru card."

"Everybody has different schemes, but what the fans in the stands ultimately want to see is success," Cutcliffe said. "We think the only way we're going to score points is to take care of all those little things where we can make big plays or sustain drives.

"It's not a magic dust that's going to be sprinkled. It's not going to be anybody who calls the play. It's a series of things that have to happen."

That's all Cutcliffe is thinking about.

He's not even sure he would entertain thoughts of becoming a head coach again.

"Just being honest, I'm not sure that's what I want to do again," he said. "I'm absolutely loving what I'm doing right now.

"That's not something you want to do unless you have a burning desire to do it. You don't even need to think about it."

Right now, Cutcliffe is thinking about a tough California defensive front seven.

He's thinking about steps and progressions, getting a young offensive line to gel and a group of talented receivers to run routes, catch balls and make big plays.

"You know how you just know you're in the right place, where you're supposed to be individually?" Cutcliffe asked. "I know I'm in the right place and this is where I'm supposed to be doing what I'm supposed to be doing."

His self-admitted "type-A personality" won't let him rest.

Yeah, he has mellowed. But his drive to be the best hasn't waned.

He's still throwing rocks, fighting and scraping to produce leaders who can produce points.

"I can promise you this, my focus is not on anything down the road," he said. "I like the thoughts of watching a bunch of players raise a trophy here.

"That's the mission and that's enough to think about right now."

It's an opportunity Cutcliffe missed when he accepted the Ole Miss job and departed for Oxford prior to UT's 1998 national championship against Florida State.

It's not something he wants to miss again.

"That's the hunger for the future," he said, "to have a chance to raise that trophy again."