Randy Smith
I don't pretend to know a whole lot about football. I know baseball much better. But I do know that the ninth ranked Tennessee Volunteers almost lost......I said almost lost to a very good Appalachian State team Thursday night at Neyland Stadium. Tennessee's 20-13 overtime win over the Mountaineers will never go down in Big Orange history as a great thriller. It will be remembered however as an all-time great nail biter.
Tennessee came out of the gates flat.....you could tell that by Cameron Sutton's fumbled punt in the first quarter.
That turnover led to a 31 yard drive by App State that gave the visitors an early 7-0 lead; a lead they maintained until the fourth quarter when the Vols finally tied the game at 13-13. When that fumble occurred, you could feel the air being let out of the big balloon that was Neyland Stadium. Appalachian State had punched Tennessee in the mouth, and for a long time, the men in orange had no answer. It was like...."How dare they do that to us."
Deep down, I felt all along that Tennessee would win the game. I sat between former Vol Eddie Moore and the legendary Gus Manning in the Vol Network booth and neither had many comments during the game. Gus did reply to me when I asked him if that hot dog and ice cream sandwich he was eating was good. He replied, "It's free ain't it?"
Appalachian State exposed a real weakness in the Tennessee offense; the inability to throw the down consistently downfield. Of course we all knew that could be a problem as the offense has basically the same personnel as last year, when quarterback Josh Dobbs also failed to connect with his wide receivers on the deep ball. App State was content to rush just three defensive linemen, and drop eight men back in coverage. That slowed down the running game and took any deep ball opportunities completely away. (Except for a 67 yard pass to Josh Malone that tied the game at 13-13 in the fourth quarter)
As far as making adjustments during the game, the Tennessee defense did the things they needed to do to shut out the Mountaineers in the second half and in overtime, but the offense made few if any adjustments in the second half that worked.
So....where do we go from here? SEC analyst "Booger" Mcfarland stated following the game, that he felt Tennessee would bounce back well against Virginia Tech in the "Battle at Bristol." All night long I felt that if Tennessee lost this opener to Appalachian State, the "Battle at Bristol" would lose most of it's sparkle. But the Vols didn't lose. They're 1-0 as they head to Bristol next weekend.
I know a lot of Tennessee fans are disappointed that it took overtime to put Appalachian State away. I know they're upset with the way the team played, and they're also worried about what lies ahead. Vol Network analyst Tim Priest told me last night that he can't remember a time when there was this much excitement about Tennessee football in the preseason. yet, all that excitement and all the hype about Vols football could have gone away after sixty minutes of football. But it didn't. The Vols won....they won ugly but they won. And to quote my grandson, Coleman Smith, a fine American....."This is the greatest place ever!"
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Randy Smith has been covering sports on radio, television and print for the past 45 years. After leaving WRCB-TV in 2009, he has written two books, and has continued to free-lance as a play-by-play announcer. He is currently teaching Broadcasting at Coahulla Creek High School near Dalton, Ga.
His career has included a 17-year stretch as host of the Kickoff Call In Show on the University of Tennessee’s prestigious Vol Network. He has been a member of the Vol Network staff for thirty years.
He has done play-by-play on ESPN, ESPN II, CSS, and Fox SportSouth, totaling more than 500 games, and served as a well-known sports anchor on Chattanooga Television for more than a quarter-century.
In 2003, he became the first television broadcaster to be inducted into the Greater Chattanooga Area Sports Hall of Fame. Randy and his wife Shelia reside in Hixson. They have two married children, (Christi and Chris Perry; Davey and Alison Smith.) They have four grandchildren, Coleman, Boone, DellaMae and CoraLee.