My favorite Vandy moment occurred on December 2, 1978 at Dudley Field, Nashville.

The last game of Johnny Majors’ second season as Vol head coach. Two years prior, Bill Battle ended his head coaching career at the same Dudley Field by defeating the Commodores 13-10. But now, Tennessee at 4-5-1 needed a win over 2-8 Vanderbilt to avoid its second consecutive losing season, not seen in Knoxville since 1910-11.

The previous week, Tennessee had defeated Kentucky on a cold, snow flurry-filled day at Neyland Stadium 29-14, behind the five field goals of the “Swahili Sidewinder” Alan Duncan that tied an SEC record. I sat in the old North End Zone bleachers that day because they were to be torn down after the following season, giving way to the new North End enclosure. That was my last chance to sit in that old structure because I was leaving the state for a career. I’m glad I did because I had the best seat in the old house to watch Alan do his thing.

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A bad season and a bye week brings up an issue...

I've been a Phillies fan since a boy, and that's a long, long time. Needless to say, I'm excited heading into the NLCS, for yet another year.

Once upon a time, though, that would be a pipe dream - that just didn't happen for very long stretches, season after season after season.

During those bad seasons, when my Phils would be virtually out of it by August 1, I would turn to another team and follow them for the rest of the way, just to keep interest in the game during the remainder of the season.

I have my favorite teams in every sport, but in each of those sports, I have my "secondary team" - a team that I like almost as much, or a team that I wish was my team but can't adopt because you just don't do that sort of thing, or a team that is simply too much fun not to watch because of their style or personnel.

And, that "other" team may change from year to year.

So here we are, in the midst of the 2010 Vol season, and we may be headed for the bottom of the deepest, darkest barrel imaginable. And, we're not playing this weekend - a perfect entry point to begin paying very close attention to a "secondary team".

You are a Vol, through thick and thin, but that doesn't mean that in times like this, or in any other time, you can't have your "other" team that you keep in your back pocket, or in the closet, hidden from everyone you know. Perhaps it's a school from your home state if you're not originally from the Volunteer State, or a school that you attended in addition to UT, or it's where a parent or sibling or son or daughter went to school, or it's a school that you picked by playing pin the tail on the donkey.

Whatever...

Who is your "other" college football team? And, what's the story behind that?

Give it up - no closet space is available.

Musings from 64 degrees north...

LSU this week, which makes me think...

...about schedules, rivals, and the SEC.

We play LSU infrequently; not enough to be exact. It could be a great rivalry. Auburn could be (again), Ole Miss could be (again), Arkansas could be, and even Mississippi State could be, given the right circumstances and developments. 

If the season were expanded by one to 13 games, we could play all of the above every season, plus the six SEC schools we already play every year, and two non-conference schools.

Sounds simple. Except that it probably will never happen.

But, suspend reality for a moment. Would you like a conference where every school plays every other school every season? I think I would.

You would never have situations such as 'unequal' schedules playing a role in the determination of the SEC champion (except for comparative home-field advantages). The standings would never lie. The best team would be at the top, because they played every other team, just like all other teams did.

The SEC season would be one helluva spectacle - not that it isn't now, but it would be even more spectacular. Just think - 11 conference games.

The SEC brass, and the headmasters at the individual schools, would probably never go for it - it would increase the likelihood of losses by the top SEC teams, potentially ruining their chance at a national crown.

But, again, suspend reality for this exercise. Would you like to see Tennessee, and all other SEC schools, play a full conference schedule every season?

I'm committing treason.

Yes, that's right, I'm going on vacation, a long one, during football season (UAB, LSU, Georgia). And, to make matters worse, I will be on an island in the Atlantic near the Arctic Circle. Not conducive to following the Vols. And, I'm probably not going to meet many Vols while I'm there. Imagine, I might be the only member of the VolNation in the country.

Well, somebody's got to plant the flag.

Which brings up an interesting question regarding fandom...

To what lengths have you gone to watch a Tennessee game when circumstances made it near impossible (or anti-social)? Have you ever watched a Tennessee game while away from North America? Have you ever watched the Vols during a life-changing event, say your wedding night, or (if a male) while your wife was giving birth to your first born, or during breaks of the school play in which your daughter was playing the lead role, or while spending a day in jail, or...

Well, you get my point. So, what's your story that shows your commitment to the Big Orange? Or maybe you have a friend or family member that had an interesting experience. Tell us about it. Hopefully, I'll have one when I return.

On Saturday night, the Vol players tired down the stretch, causing Coach Dooley to comment that he was disappointed in the teams effort. "I think the team quit after the pick six" said Dooley. Later, Dooley added some insight to what he meant. "Sometimes players, nowdays, they get so focused on wanting to win that they don't enjoy the competitive element of the game. They don't enjoy when it gets tough, how to fight through it." Dooley wants his players to play "without thinking about the result and thinking more about how to compete that play. What happens with our team is we get so caught up in getting behind, we start thinking about losing the game and we don't compete."

That's exactly what happened against Oregon. They got their dauber down, knowing they were falling deeper behind, became dispirited, and allowed the Ducks to run all over Shields-Watkins Field. The players have a long way to go to "carry the fight to our opponent and keep it there for 60 minutes" (the Seventh Maxim of Robert Neyland), especially against quality opposition.

With a teacher like Dooley (his words quoted above cause me to call him a teacher - a very high compliment), these players will learn how to give 60 minutes against the best teams. I'll be you will see better fight from the Vols next week if they're down a couple of TDs when tired in the second half.

As far as the fans are concerned, I'm not so sure.

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The Oregon Ducks come flying into Knoxville for this week's entry into the history of intersectional Vol games. It brings a lot of memories, for we have faced our share of formidable programs from outside the South: Notre Dame, Southern Cal, UCLA, Cal, Iowa, Pitt, and many more. I have special memories of the two games the Vols played against Penn State in the early 1970s. Those were classic games, and important as college football was beginning to become a dominant sport for national television. [and important in the lore of Southern football: Paterno didn't like the idea of coming South to play football because it was too hot - so we had lights installed at Neyland Stadium!]

There are a ton of interconference rivalries; the South is full of them (Ga-Ga Tech; Fla-Fla State; etc). But there aren't any true intersectional rivalries other than Southern Cal - Notre Dame. They have been going at it annually (except for three years during WWII) since 1926 when the wives of prominent figures from both schools decided a home-and-home series would be a good idea. It is a special part of the annual college football calendar.

As a college football fan, I love intersectional games. As well as winning national and conference championships, I think they are important to the maintenance of a program's visibility/marketability. And, they give your squad and coaching staff a special challenge in preparation, especially when your school goes across country for the game (think Eugene in 2011).

But what would you think about taking it a step further...

If you had the power to wave your wand and click your heels, would you favor Tennessee playing the same intersectional foe every season, to create an intersectional rivalry?

And if so, what school would be your top choice?

Irrational. That's what you really know is the truth behind all of those idiocyncratic rituals related to watching your favorite sports teams.

But you do them anyway. How mysterious - not the relationship between the ritual and the supposed observed result, but the fact that you do them at all invokes introspection.

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