Tennessee Football: Color it Wonderful

  By Tom Mattingly “Tennessee Football… from corner to corner” was published in the preseason of 1966. Head coach Doug Dickey and captains Austin Denney and Paul Naumoff adorned the magazine’s cover. The cover raised the possibility of a trip to Miami during bowl...

Great stories behind the numbers

By Tom Mattingly There are times the game-by-game scores in the Tennessee Football Record Book are just a mind-numbing array of numbers, assembled neatly over the years, stretching from that first game in 1891 through the recent years. No one has quite had the...

‘I have to be at practice’

  By Tom Mattingly Writing assignments often appear as if by magic. That’s been the case in my writing career over the years. You’ll likely recognize many, if not all, of the names mentioned in this column. One memorable contest came in November 1971, when a...

A Road Warrior Par Excellence

  By Tom Mattingly Tennessee and Notre Dame squared off at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Ind., on Nov. 3, 2001, as a crowd of 80,795 watched on a picture perfect November day. It was one of those afternoons the South Bend Chamber of Commerce would like to...

A great deal of talk and little action

By Tom Mattingly The year was 1969, and the venue was Neyland Stadium/Shields-Watkins Field. The game matched Tennessee and Vanderbilt in the season finale. Tennessee won 40-27, with the Vols annexing a second SEC title in the past three years. Losses to Mississippi...