Tennessee coach Josh Heupel was still hearing the roar of the crowd when he got home.
Heupel said that it was a good thing. You don't want to forget a scene like that because there's always the next game. I've never seen something like that before.
Tennessee's 38-33 win over Florida on Saturday was a game that, in typical fashion for this series, went down to the very end.
In the eyes of long-suffering Tennessee fans, it was a game that looked familiar in those final frantic minutes. After recovering an onside kick, the Gators were able to score on a quarterback sneak from the Tennessee 39-yard line.
Young hit Richardson as he threw the ball, and Hadden picked off the pass at the 6 yard line to seal the game.
Heupel or anyone wearing Tennessee's shade of orange exhaled.
It's like a punching bag. "You're waiting for that next blow to come, you're just waiting for your alma mater to do something it hasn't done in 18 years," saidRusty, who made the trip from Michigan with his sons and sons-in-law to see his alma mater play
We've had a lot of pain against them. You want us to make a mistake. This team isn't the same.
Heupel hammered home to his players that this was a different team, a different game, a different year. He was aware that the scars run deep among the Big Orange faithful when it comes to the Gators, who had dominated this rivalry back to the time of Phillip Fulmer's successful tenure at Tennessee.
Heupel soaked up the moment with his players and the fans, most of whom stayed in the stands for nearly 20 minutes after the game.
Heupel promised that the players would feel the passion of the fan base.
The Pride of the Southland marching band played "Rocky Top" loudly and long enough for it to be heard in every corner of the state, from Mohawk to Union City and all points in between.
Haven't been many of these moments for @Vol_Football over the last two decades when @GatorsFB has come to town. Rocky Top was rocking. pic.twitter.com/3e79RkyhJN
— Chris Low (@ClowESPN) September 25, 2022
This wasn't the best Florida team that Tennessee has faced in the past. The Vols were 1012 point favorites, the most since the 1970s. Billy Napier is in his first season at Florida and the Gators have some big holes to fill.
"It just seems like a lot of good things happen to the Gators in this game and a lot of bad things happen to the Vols," Spurrier said last week.
In 1998, the year of the Vols' last national championship, the Big Orange Nation had a lot of fun. With Tennessee having a bye week, the party may continue for a while.
It's amazing to be able to come here and see how things have changed since I first arrived. We want to keep getting it better and better.
Saturday's scene will be difficult to duplicate.
A group of former players came to hug him. Current players hugged each other. There was a man there. They weren't bashful about lighting up victory cigars, as well as two generations of Colquitts.
Foster, a four-time Pro Bowler, played his last game at Tennessee in the 2008 season.
Foster, who led the NFL in 2010 with 1,616 yards rushing, promised that he would return.
Tony Vitello, Tennessee's fiery baseball coach, had done his part to fire up the crowd before the game, and he was a big hit after. He said his main goal was to not be arrested.
It looks like he achieved that goal and didn't push any officials. "If we win, everybody could go streaking," he said on College GameDay.
A breakthrough of sorts for a football program that has wallowed around in a gator-infested wasteland for most of the past two decades took place on that day. The Vols had more coaches than they had wins over the Gators in the last 30 years.
Wilson spoke for the entire Tennessee fan base when he said he still felt the pain of the Florida losses going all the way back to the 1990's.
Three of the games I lost at college were to Florida. Come on. Wilson is the heart and soul of Tennessee's 1998 national championship team.
Earl and Judy Brown are some of the most devoted Tennessee fans. Earl has been to every Tennessee football game since 1996 and hasn't missed a single game.
Brown said there was joy and relief. We were the better team a lot of the time. This is the one that leads us back to where we want to be again.
Since 2007, the Vols have not won more than eight games in a season.
Stephen has not missed a Tennessee SEC game in the last seven years. He lives a few blocks from the stadium. One of the reasons he moved there was to be close to the football cathedral.
It doesn't matter if it's a defensive battle or the way we play now with a lot of offense, people just want to win. People don't want to hear that you're improving or that you're a class away. It's so important that they just want to win.
That's why he didn't mind taking the eight-hour drive to be in Knoxville on Saturday. He spent over $700 per night for a hotel room for three upper deck tickets and three tickets in the lower deck.
It's up there with the '98 Florida game in terms of craziness. I don't recall it being that loud. The Tennessee fans wanted this. We haven't had hope in a long time. In less than two years, Heupel has accomplished a lot.
Heupel has endeared himself to his players because of his steady demeanor. There were 18 Level 1 violations for impermissible recruiting benefits that led to Jeremy Pruitt's firing. Heupel has steered the Vols to their highest ranking in six years despite the NCAA cloud.
Scott Altizer, who returned as director of football relations last year after 20 years on Tennessee's football staff, said that the players play hard for Josh because he is unafraid. Let it all hang out and have fun.
Clausen sees a version of Tennessee that he hasn't seen in a while, a version that falls in line with Heupel's go-for-broke, warp-speed offense.
"For the younger generation of players, they don't know about the past with Florida or anyone else, nor do they care or should they care," said Clausen, who lives in California and still follows the Vol.
All the other noise doesn't matter because Coach Heupel says it's our team versus their team. Even though the team doesn't play its best football, you can see that in how they play.
He's going to get there because he's not playing with the same players that other SEC teams do. Why wouldn't a big-time skill player want to play in that offense?
Some of the top prospects on the Vols' board were in town.
Heupel practiced what he preaches. The players were in the locker room after the game. Heupel might have been showing off a few moves of his own in the middle of that group of 125 players.
"If you can't have fun in that environment, you can't have fun anywhere," said Heupel, who showcased his best vertical leap since his Oklahoma playing days and got in a few Tiger Woods-sized fist pumps.
Heupel usually has a large contingent of family in town for home games, and by the time he got home Saturday night after meeting with recruits and doing his TV show, he switched roles from coach to uncle.
He was able to spend some time with his wife at the end of the night.
Heupel said they looked at each other and said "What a great day." It was a big moment for us, as we continue to build this program and how much the players have invested. When you're a part of the climb, it's a lot of fun.
Pick games and play for prizes. Pick your favorites.
The Vols are still in the early stages of their climb. They will play LSU and Alabama in October. On top of that, there is a game with Kentucky on October 29 and a trip to Georgia in November. The win over Florida was only the fifth Tennessee victory over Alabama, Florida or Georgia since the start of Fulmer's final season in 2008.
Heupel was at the football complex at 7:30 on Sunday to meet with recruits.
He said there was always another big game around the corner.
Heupel isn't going to get ahead of himself despite the fact that the Vols have more points through four games than any Tennessee team since 1915. In their first two games against nationally ranked opponents, the Vols made a lot of mistakes, which resulted in defeats.
The pass on defense has been a problem for Tennessee, both in getting to the quarterback and covering the receiver. The offensive line and defensive secondary are precariously thin.
Heupel said that there are a lot of things that the team can do better. The crowd could sense that we didn't finish the game the way we needed to, when Florida got the onside kick. Our group keeps playing, that's what I like about it.
The Heupels have a tradition of having all of their family members take a picture on the field after a game.
Heupel and his wife looked at the pictures.
"We're all standing there together and the stadium is still checkerboarded behind us and this is probably 20 minutes after the game had ended," he said. That is going to be a great background for that picture.
Heupel would love to have a few more pictures like that.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
