‘We want Bama! We want Bama!’
By Tom Mattingly
Football fans sometimes get what they want, and it isn’t pretty.
Despite the best of intentions, there are days and nights in various venues that seem longer than most, when everything that can go wrong does.
On Oct. 11, 1980, Tennessee was in the final stages of defeating Georgia Tech at Grant Field in Atlanta. The final score was 23-10, but the outcome was in doubt until the final minutes. Vol fans seemed happy at the turn of events.
The Alabama game, to be played a week later, was not far from Vol fans’ attention, to the point that once victory was certain, here came the cry from the Vol faithful all across that famed arena.
“We want Bama! We want Bama!”
In retrospect, that wasn’t smart. Talk about your mouth overloading your brain.
A week later, Alabama (and ABC, too) did show up at Neyland Stadium. The final score was 27-0, Crimson Tide, in a rain-swept game that wasn’t that close. That started a 4-game losing streak, as the Vols also lost to Pitt, Virginia, and Ole Miss before righting the ship against Kentucky and Vanderbilt.
Consider how one game affects another game a year or so away. The 1986 Auburn game, played Sept. 26 at Jordan-Hare Stadium, came a year after the Tigers, then rated No. 1, had an eternity to deal with a 38-20 loss in Knoxville.
Tony Robinson had thrown the ball all over the field, and Vol defenders put the clamps on eventual Heisman Trophy winner Bo Jackson. Robinson ended up on the cover of the next week’s Sports Illustrated. On this day, Auburn exacted a toll on the Vols, winning 34-8.
There was another long afternoon for the Vols in the 1954 season finale against Vanderbilt on Dudley Field. That must have been a tough one for Vol fans to swallow, with Vanderbilt winning 26-0. Vandy had only beaten the Vols once since 1937, so emotions ran high.
Vanderbilt fans were yelling, “Block that kick! Block that kick!” as Tennessee lined up for the second half kickoff.
That game’s outcome, accompanied by a four-game losing streak to finish the 1954 campaign, led to athletic director Bob Neyland firing head coach Harvey Robinson and the entire staff in the ensuing weeks. That resulted in former Vol All-American and 1938 captain Bowden Wyatt heading home from Fayetteville, Ark., to Knoxville.
In 1990, Florida fans weren’t happy about losing 45-3 in Knoxville and turned the tables a year later, 35-18, thanks to a number of Vol turnovers.
One final “even-up” came in 1995, when the Vols lost to the Gators 62-37. A hard rain hit Florida Field in the latter stages of that contest with the Gators ahead. Florida fans enjoyed the deluge as much as Vol fans had three years earlier in Knoxville.
Even a narrow, last-second win can cause great exuberance among the opposing fan base. Take Alabama 6, Tennessee 3, in October 2005.
Alabama insiders said the ensuing crowd reaction at game’s end was among the top periods of unrestrained joy at the Capstone in their memory. Bryant-Denny Stadium overflowed with emotion, even if Tide fans had to be reminded what sport they were watching. For the uninitiated, every so often when things were going well, an announcement came booming over the public address system.
“This is Alabama football!”
In 1970, Tennessee fans couldn’t wait for Florida to hit Shields-Watkins Field after Doug Dickey had changed his mailing address from Knoxville to Gainesville.
There was enough hoopla around the contest to satisfy the most hardened fan, as Tennessee won 38-7. There were songs, and that term is debatable, written about both head coaches. From the Tennessee side, there was a composition entitled “Tricky Dickey,” while Florida fans came up with one called, “Bad Billy Battle, You Mean and Nasty Boy.”
A great many of us old folks remember the Nov. 15, 1969, Ole Miss game in Jackson. That was definitely a long day, especially when you consider the Vols eventually did win the SEC title. For some reason, many Vol fans seem to discount that accomplishment, then as well as now.
The Rebels’ Cloyce Hinton kicked a field goal just before halftime that bounced over the cross bar, extending the lead from 21-0 to 24-0. Tennessee SID Haywood Harris responded tersely with the shortest quote ever in Sports Illustrated: “Dang!”
No one is still around who might have seen or heard about the four-game swing in 1893, starting in Knoxville against Kentucky A&M and carrying on through games at Winston-Salem, Durham, and Chapel Hill. The games started Oct. 21 and ended Nov. 7, losses by a combined total of 250-0.
Now, there was a series of really long days. So long, in fact, that some players refused to admit they had even played that season.
Wonder how losing 250-0 over the course of four games would play out today?
