A Moral Victory: I'll Take It, I'm Glad Kiffin Won't
A Moral Victory: I'll Take It, I'm Glad Kiffin Won't
The Vols lost to Florida last Saturday. I don't think that surprised anyone. The 30 point line that Vegas had set was the largest against a Volunteer team in my lifetime. By now the gameplan and result have been well documented. Lane Kiffin wanted to control the clock via the running game. In doing so he would be able to take the pressure off of Jonathan Crompton and keep the ball out of Tim Tebow's hands. The plan was executed well and had it not been for an inability to convert redzone appearances into touchdowns the result might have been different.
The most positive take-away for me was not that we played the national champs to a 10 point margin, it wasn't that we ran the ball effectively, and it wasn't that we made Superman look like a turnover-prone Clark Kent. The most positive thing for me was that Coach Kiffin was not content. In postgame comments he talked about being disappointed and that the Vols had come to Gainesville to win. He mentioned that he wishes their could be a rematch this year and even talked about how the Gators might fare next year without Tebow. He was not going to accept this as a moral victory, at least not publicly. He and the UT football program have too much pride to be happy with a conference loss, no matter how good the opponent and no matter how down we are. I was very encouraged by this because I'll be the first to admit, I was relieved that we didn't lose by 100. During the fourth quarter when the outcome was obvious I was excited that they weren't going to cover the point spread. Then I heard Kiffin's comments and realized that not only do we have a coach who can stay on the same field with Urban Meyer, he is also genuinely disappointed that we don't win games we are supposed to lost by 30 points. Even though Kiffin won't accept it as such, this moral victory made me feel great about our coaching staff on the heels of such a demoralizing loss to UCLA.
Random Observations:
Did anyone notice that at the postgame hand-shake Urban complimented Lane on the effort of his football team? He said something like, "Your guys played hard." I thought this was a bit ironic especially since Gator players have questioned the effort of certain Vols in the teams last two meetings. You'll remember Brandon Spikes accused our guys of quitting. I just thought that was interesting.
Also, I'm sure you all noticed in the post-game on-field interview Kiffin was asked if he was disappointed about not being able to sing Rocky Top all night long. His reply was classic. As the Pride of the Southland Marching Band was playing Rocky Top right behind him he had to ask the reporter to repeat the question. He said something along the lines of, "I'm sorry. I didn't hear the question. Rocky Top was playing."
The Vols lost to Florida last Saturday. I don't think that surprised anyone. The 30 point line that Vegas had set was the largest against a Volunteer team in my lifetime. By now the gameplan and result have been well documented. Lane Kiffin wanted to control the clock via the running game. In doing so he would be able to take the pressure off of Jonathan Crompton and keep the ball out of Tim Tebow's hands. The plan was executed well and had it not been for an inability to convert redzone appearances into touchdowns the result might have been different.
The most positive take-away for me was not that we played the national champs to a 10 point margin, it wasn't that we ran the ball effectively, and it wasn't that we made Superman look like a turnover-prone Clark Kent. The most positive thing for me was that Coach Kiffin was not content. In postgame comments he talked about being disappointed and that the Vols had come to Gainesville to win. He mentioned that he wishes their could be a rematch this year and even talked about how the Gators might fare next year without Tebow. He was not going to accept this as a moral victory, at least not publicly. He and the UT football program have too much pride to be happy with a conference loss, no matter how good the opponent and no matter how down we are. I was very encouraged by this because I'll be the first to admit, I was relieved that we didn't lose by 100. During the fourth quarter when the outcome was obvious I was excited that they weren't going to cover the point spread. Then I heard Kiffin's comments and realized that not only do we have a coach who can stay on the same field with Urban Meyer, he is also genuinely disappointed that we don't win games we are supposed to lost by 30 points. Even though Kiffin won't accept it as such, this moral victory made me feel great about our coaching staff on the heels of such a demoralizing loss to UCLA.
Random Observations:
Did anyone notice that at the postgame hand-shake Urban complimented Lane on the effort of his football team? He said something like, "Your guys played hard." I thought this was a bit ironic especially since Gator players have questioned the effort of certain Vols in the teams last two meetings. You'll remember Brandon Spikes accused our guys of quitting. I just thought that was interesting.
Also, I'm sure you all noticed in the post-game on-field interview Kiffin was asked if he was disappointed about not being able to sing Rocky Top all night long. His reply was classic. As the Pride of the Southland Marching Band was playing Rocky Top right behind him he had to ask the reporter to repeat the question. He said something along the lines of, "I'm sorry. I didn't hear the question. Rocky Top was playing."
