University of Tennessee Athletics
Inside the T Mailbag: Tradition! Tradition!
November 26, 2014 | General
Each week, UTSports.com's Brian Rice answers questions from Vol fans on a variety of topics in and around Tennessee athletics. Send yours to him on Twitter: @briancrice or to UTSportsMailbag@gmail.com. On to this week's mailbag:
David: What is your favorite game day tradition?
Ironic that this question came across this week, because I actually celebrated my favorite tradition for the final time last weekend. I'm going WAY off the board for this one, but bear with me.
One of my favorite things to do on game day has been to partake in the group viewing of earlier football games in the theater in the University Center. When we would come to campus early when I was a kid, we would eat downstairs at the UC, then catch some of the earlier games in there before it was time to walk outside for the band Salute to the Hill at the Kickoff Call-in Show.
Now, we went to plenty of movies when I was growing up, but young me was absolutely mesmerized that they could take things on TV and put them up on a movie screen. Make that football, and you really had something.
As I grew to appreciate football more, particularly the intricacies of things like SEC Divisional Standings, those games started to take on more meaning. At least, some of them. Day game or night game, you could always count on the theater first showing the 12:30 Jefferson Pilot/Lincoln Financial/Raycom/SEC-TV Game of the Week. You guys older than 25 know what I'm talking about.
In the days before every SEC game being televised, this game was the very last TV pick every week. So while it wasn't a terrible game, it was still going to be the worst televised game, but you were going to watch it because it was a great appetizer for the rest of the football day. It usually featured one ranked SEC team and another SEC team that they were going to beat. By a lot.
But the "other" team would frequently make this a game for about a half. Underdogs have always thrived at noon, then would crush our hopes by giving up a crucial TD early in the second half en route to a lopsided, but closer-than-expected loss.
If the Tennessee game was at night, that meant you got to see the first half of the CBS game as well, a time slot that created plenty of unusual rooting interests over the years. A room full of orange-clad Tennessee fans that all vowed to never cheer for Alabama in anything? Saw them cheer when an Alabama win over Florida would send the Vols to the SEC Championship Game. Game for a Georgia game or two. Division standings create strange bedfellows.
When I said I celebrated it for the final time last week, I don't mean for the season. The current University Center building, including the theater, is scheduled to be demolished this summer as part of the new Student Union project. Many of the services in the current UC will be available in the new building, but the manager on duty said Saturday that it was still to be determined whether the new theater in the new building will host football viewing. The Student Union will have TVs throughout and he told me that they would likely just put different games on those and not open the theater. It's progress and something else that will be great for fans. But I'll always have memories of the old, dark theater and the odd group rooting for and against rivals.
Mac: Any chance of a north end zone Jumbotron so those of us in the south side can see a replay without breaking our necks?
It has been something that has been looked into on several occasions, most recently when the north end was renovated in the mid-2000s. Adding a board on that side remains something that can't be engineered properly to work.
It's not just plopping a screen on top of the roof and being done with it. You're talking about attaching something that, while very heavy, is ultimately a four-story wind sail to the top of the stadium. You have to dig pretty deeply to secure it, as they did in the south end zone. As it stands now, the way the Hill is positioned, as well as the location of the Alumni Memorial Building will not allow supports to be placed for something like that.
You never say never, though. Everyone agrees it's something that would be great to have and the technology is always evolving. Remember, it was once thought to be impossible to have a center-hung scoreboard in Thompson-Boling, but eventually the technology came around with lighter boards and ways to reinforce the roof and we now have a beautiful videoboard in the arena.
Jon Arde: Before last week, when was the last time UT lost consecutive senior day games?
Jon, don't make me sad in the middle of the mailbag.
It was 1975 (Vanderbilt) and 1976 (Kentucky). Including last week, UT has lost on Senior Day just four times since, 1984 (Kentucky), 2005 (Vanderbilt), 2013 (Vanderbilt) and 2014 (Missouri).
Jim: Can you convince anyone to recreate Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown this week?
I am making this a priority. It may not be this week, but I must make this happen.
Ryan: How much would it cost to add 50 more cameras to the stadium so I don't have to see blogs post pics of the same bad angles on offside calls?
The easy answer here is to install a permanent Skycam system in every stadium, then it could always hang out on the goal line or first down line, or wherever controversy may be ready to rear its ugly head.
Except I have an unhealthy, but I believe entirely rational, fear of Skycam and related systems. It's fallen before:
And in NASCAR:
So that's not a solution.
I propose GoPros on the yard and down markers, then there is always one at the line of scrimmage and on the first down line. Inside the 10, make a member of the chain gang hold the yard marker on the goal line. Boom. Problem solved.
Terry: Do you prefer to be called Big Orange Oracle or The Blond Lexicon?
I've always wanted to be an Oracle.
Jacob, Caleb, and several others: Any chance of Tennessee honoring Eric Berry this weekend?
The announcement from the Kansas City Chiefs that Eric Berry will miss the rest of the season after a mass was discovered in his chest hit us all pretty hard here at UT. As beloved of a figure as he is to fans, he is even more beloved by the people that worked with him when he was a player and the staff that has interacted with him since he went to the NFL.
Obviously, his brothers Evan and Elliott are current players, so this is a real family matter for everyone that wears orange.
Butch Jones was asked the question at his Tuesday press briefing after practice. There may be an update later in the week, but here's what Butch said:
"We are in the process of evaluating some things. We will know a little bit more later in the week. We want to obviously respect Eric and his family. We have been in constant dialogue and communication."
