Vols: From A Fans Perspective

The Vols loss to Oklahoma yesterday broke hearts all over Tennessee and beyond.

Many writers will offer explanations of just what happened yesterday in Neyland Stadium. They will write about choking, halftime adjustments, conservative play calling and the “must learn to close out games” cliche. Heck, I’ll do that later myself.

I will give my opinion in a later article today about the football game between the Tennessee Vols and the Oklahoma Sooners.  Right now I can’t. It hurts too much to even replay in my head. You see, I don’t just write about the Vols, I live and breath the Vols.

It does not matter if it is Football, Baseball, Basketball, or Chess Team, I am all in. I went there to school. My wife and children as well. It is a long history that started back in the late 1960’s and grew in the 70’s.

I love the Power T. I love the Orange and White. I love Neyland. I love the Band, the pageantry, the history, the University, and the fans. I love it all.

So last night stung. It stung bad.

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As soon as the Tennessee field goal sailed wide right with the Vols leading the Sooners by 14 I knew what was coming. It is not a Tennessee thing. It is a football thing. If you let a team hang around, they will find a way to win.

Tennessee allowed the Sooners to circle their covered wagons and come back to win. It was a combination of many factors. Most of all Oklahoma outplayed the Vols. They were  desperate, and had to make plays to get back in the game. The young Vols were trying to maintain a lead. There is a big difference in playing cautious, and having to play aggressive in order to make plays.

The referees were absolutely horrible. I don’t know how some of these guys get to the level they are presently refereeing. This pathetic group missed two crucial calls during the Sooner final drive that directly led to the Sooners final score to tie.

The pass interference call on Malik Foreman on a ball that was thrown beyond the end zone and the blatant miss of an Oklahoma illegal procedure on a crucial third down were inexcusable. Referees should not directly affect the outcome of a game. These guys did not help Tennessee.

Again, I am writing as a fan. The bad calls just seem to mount when you want something so bad. I came up through the glory years of Tennessee football in the eighties and nineties. Tennessee was a top ten program year in and year out. Bad calls didn’t matter then it seemed.

We dominated Alabama for more than a decade, and every other team other than Florida. We beat UCLA, Notre Dame, Michigan, Florida State. Miami, Auburn, LSU, Ohio State and anyone that was anyone in College Football. That is the Tennessee I know.

Now Tennessee is 1-28 in the last 29 games playing ranked teams. That is unbelievable to me. It is as easy to deny this a Tennessee fan as an alcoholic denies they have a drinking problem. You just don’t see what others see, only what you perceive.

Yesterday we had a great group of Tennessee fans and friends watching the game. We have gathered in the stadium and out of the stadium for years. This particular group that assembles nowadays with us have never seen success at Tennessee. Only heartache.

So yesterday it hurt us all. We are all extremely proud of the University of Tennessee players for playing as hard as they did. We are impressed with this group of players, and the coaching staff. They have brought Tennessee back to where they are so, so close to being as prominent as we think we should be.

This team is going to win a lot of games this year. This one just slipped through our hands again. It makes you wonder if God has something against Tennessee. How do you explain the way a slow footed Baker Mayfield (quarterback of Oklahoma) eluded Vol tacklers that had him wrapped around the legs time and time again? He looked as if he was wearing greased pants the way the Vols were sliding down to his feet, and finally off.

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Again as a fan, it is hard to watch the opposition celebrate on your own field. The videos are out of the classless sportsmanship displayed by the Oklahoma players coming off of the field. Birds were shot, players taunting fans and players of Tennessee, and Butch Jones telling a Sooner to have some class. I am sure that they heard an earful all night long themselves.

The game is different now. Things are said in the heat of battle that were not said in my day. You see I played ball. I was a high school quarterback. And although it is not a level at which Tennessee plays, I did learn how to win, and how to lose.

Most in the stands never played. They can drink,  talk in a foul manner, and act like they know something about football. They can write a misspelled laden facebook post about how Coach Butch Jones has got to go. I saw posts that people made call Butch Jones every kind of loser there could be. We need to blow it up and start all over they typed. Are you freaking kidding me?

They have no idea of what these players go through daily to play for their University. They have no concept that the other team playing that day is actually on scholarship for a reason as well. They have no idea of how difficult the game of football actually is to play. They think you should score on every play, on every drive, and on every occasion. Well, get another Beer.

These fans don’t have a clue of how to win, and how to lose. But as a Tennessee fan, we are tired of watching others gloat. We want to gloat ourselves. I get it. I have a Alabama fan that I am acquainted with. He was way to0 large and out of shape to have ever played a sport in school. Extremely, extremely un-athletic.

During the domination years I never mentioned a word about Tennessee kicking that tail yet again. I know that is not what you do, again, because that was what I was taught when playing.

Now this guy makes fun of Tennessee at every chance he gets. I am tired of it as a fan. I don’t want to have to listen to that. The only way to have that stop is for Tennessee to win. If you don’t want a pathetic display of a human being like Will Muschamp to look into a nationally televised camera and say “I love to see all of these people in this stadium disappointed”. then win.

If you don’t want to see an Oklahoma player walk around a stadium saying “send your recruits to OU”, then win. If you don’t want your overweight, obnoxious, un-athletic Alabama fan making fun of your school and team, then win.

The problem is you can’t do anything about it. You can only control what you control. You can control your mouth first. You can control your attitude. You can control yourself and remind yourself that this is a game played by 18-22 year olds that are busting their tails to get better each day.

The Vol players are banging heads, lifting like beasts, running, conditioning, and studying while you are cooking your hotdogs, reaching for another cold beer, or typing those absolutely stupid messages that Butch Jones needs to go, or Joshua Dobbs should be benched.

We need to remember it is a game.  Again, it is a game played by 18-22 year olds. No one wants to win more than me. I feel terrible all week long when we lose. I mean it is truly depressing all week. The issue here is that it says a lot more about me than it does Butch Jones and the University of Tennessee football team. I need to work on my own self esteem, and not rely on Butch Jones and some 18 year olds to give that to me. That is for Alabama fans. Others may need to look inward too.