Yes, I'm rutherford county native. When I was at Oakland high school (1985-1988) many of the kids I knew had moved here from other states and they didn't care about any of the state colleges but most of the college-bound kids went to MT. I know of a few who attended auburn, ttu, and vandy.
When I was at MT I met many folks who were from the mid-state that had transferred from ut-k to MT, so they could be closer to home, but there were numerous people here from other states attending MT. I think enrollment was around 15K at the time and Murfreesboro had a population less than 50K.
Now that Murfreesboro has a population of 160K, and MT having more stringent enrollment requirements, there are more than enough students to go around.
The problem is that the state won't allow MT to have professional programs. Apparently MT is only good enough to prep kids for Meharry and tsu.