A chant of, “It’s great to be a Tennessee Vol,” rang through Neyland Stadium at the end of UT’s 34-20 loss to Alabama on Saturday night, and it felt like the Vols had just blown out Chattanooga, not lost to a major rival.
It was certainly a lot better to be a Tennessee Vol in the second half than in the first when the Crimson Tide rolled up 27 quick points to silence a sellout crowd.
The Vols rallied; they showed some life, and the fans who stayed until the end seemed to respect that.
Even UT head coach Butch Jones opened his postgame remarks on a gleeful note by commending his team for its resiliency.
The prevailing postgame vibe in the stadium and in Jones’ press conference felt something like, “well, we lost, but (thanks to a couple of clumsy Alabama fumbles in the second half) the score ended up looking respectable so we can leave smiling and feeling OK about ourselves.”
To be clear, Jones didn’t say that, and he did address the issues that cost UT the game. But his postgame remarks and the general feeling in the stadium painted a picture that showed appeasement with a moral victory.
However, where it matters most – in the locker room – and to the player who it matters most to, there was nothing acceptable about what transpired on the field.
UT’s emotional leader, redshirt junior defensive end Curt Maggitt, offered a reality check to the a Vols’ defense that gave up 23 first downs, 469 yards and allowed Alabama to convert on 11-of-15 third downs.
The unit played its worst game of the season, and it’s easy to push aside the implications that has on the rest of UT’s season to instead bask in the hope-inspiring play of quarterback Joshua Dobbs and the potential revitalization of a previously anemic UT offense.
“We lost our identity,” Maggitt answered when a reporter asked him about his postgame speech to the defense. “We didn’t play to our capability, our level. Third downs is where we’re known for getting off the field, and that’s where we let the team down.
“I told them, ‘Guys, we’ve got to be critical of ourselves and correct that.'”
It wasn’t just third downs that made a previously apt defense look clueless, either.
Entering the game, Tennessee defensive backs and coaches pretended they knew who Amari Cooper was.
Apparently they had no idea. At least a few players should have remembered his coming out party in 2012 at Neyland Stadium when he burned the Vols with 162 receiving yards and two touchdowns as a true freshman.
Now, he’s a serious Heisman Trophy contender because UT once again rolled out the crimson carpet for him.
Cooper finished with two touchdowns and an Alabama-record 224 receiving yards. He burned every UT defender that lined up against him, including star sophomore cornerback Cameron Sutton, who is not invincible after all.
Tennessee’s offense found the spark it needed with Dobbs and a re-arranged offensive line. It looked like an offense with an identity.
But Maggitt is right. The defense lost its identity on Saturday.
That should be enough to dampen the moral victory of not getting blown out by Alabama.
David Cobb is a senior in journalism and electronic media. He can be reached at [email protected].
