Tennessee Finally Finds a Coach

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In the interest of proper disclosure, I should begin by saying that my two favorite college football teams are Alabama and whoever is playing Tennessee, but the Volunteers have a rich, storied tradition and deserved better than they got from Lane Kiffin who bolted with five years left on a six-year contract when Southern Cal came calling.

It was a rough few days up in Knoxville.  Kiffin, after promising Tennessee fans the moon, suddenly announced that he was leaving.  I understand.  He was a So Cal assistant for many years and jumped at the chance to return home to accept his dream job.  Tennessee fans thought he already had a dream job and didn't understand.  Students, players and others surrounded the athletic buildings on campus and burned mattresses and T-shirts with Kiffin's "It's Time" slogan, painted obscenities on The Rock, and forced Kiffin and his family to spend their last night in Knoxville under police protection.

The most troubling aspect of the whole kerfuffle was that Tennessee was now without a head football coach (although they could have just made interim coach Kippy Brown's title more permanent) less than three weeks before National Signing Day.  They needed a new coach before the weekend when potential recruits would be visiting the campus.  They tried to woo Will Muschamp away from Texas, but the defensive coordinator is just waiting on Mack Brown to retire so that he can take his place as head coach; his dream job.

David Cutcliffe, the head coach at Duke and a two-time former assistant at Tennessee, was also wooed but he passed on the job.  I was amazed.  I know that the head coaching job at Tennessee is his dream job, but he honored the commitment he had made to Duke...

"You follow your heart in big decisions," Cutcliffe told ESPN.com's Heather Dinich. "I have a lot of ties and a lot of people that I'm very close to, and a lot of respect for the University of Tennessee, but my heart is here. We've worked very hard these two years to change the culture, to change the team physically. You feel like the job's not done, and in this era, it bothers me, what we do as coaches, moving here and there. This is mid-January. Nothing about that felt right to me as a person."

Utah's Kyle Whittingham also reportedly turned down the job.  The final interviews were with Temple's Al Golden, Houston's Kevin Sumlin, and Louisiana Tech's Derek Dooley.  The Vols settled on Derek Dooley, the son of legendary Georgia coach Vince Dooley. Dooley, like Kiffen, comes to Knoxville with a very thin head coaching record. He was just 17-20 in three seasons at La Tech, but won the Independence Bowl in 2008.  He also served as the school's athletic director and worked as an assistant under Nick Saban for seven seasons at LSU and with the Miami Dolphins.

It's a big jump from the WAC to the SEC, and Dooley's first task was to settle Vols fans down.  He offered some reassuring words in his introductory press conference...

"The times of worrying about what happened is over," Dooley said.

Dooley talked about how he learned early that Tennessee represented the essence of college football, and remembers watching the weekly television shows of former coaches Johnny Majors and Phillip Fulmer. He also promised he will not try to sell Tennessee in a sound bite, perhaps taking a shot at Kiffin, who was reprimanded by the Southeastern Conference for brash comments.

"Everything we're going to do is going to be done with a foundation of integrity with every aspect of the program," Dooley said. "We're going to represent this institution with class on and off the field."

The restless nights are finally over in Knoxville...or maybe they're just beginning.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Tennessee Hires Louisiana Tech's Dooley as Coach (nytimes.com)
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• Tennessee's Hire Shows Racism Is Alive and Well in College Football (bleacherreport.com)

Alabama Wins!

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More than 24 hours later, and I'm still giddy over the Alabama Crimson Tide's 37-21 victory over the Texas Longhorns in the BCS National Championship Game.  It's Alabama's first championship since 1992, and either their eighth or twelfth or thirteenth or seventeenth national championship -- it all depends on who's doing the counting and what they're counting.

The eight championships are from the Poll Era (1936-present) and include AP and UPI polls, and not necessarily both in the same year.  The College Football Data Warehouse says that Alabama has twelve championships dating back to 1925.  The school claims thirteen championships and has the merchandise to prove it.  If you count every championship recognized by any sort of reputable source, whether it was a consensus pick or not, you can count seventeen for the Crimson Tide.  The school picked up four trophies for their Thursday night win -- the crystal BCS trophy along with others from the Associated Press, the National Football Foundation, and the Football Writers Association.

The SEC is now 6-0 in BCS Championship games and has won the last four straight.  Florida won in 2006 and 2008, LSU won in 2007.  Coach Nick Saben became the second coach (Urban Meyer) to win two BCS championships and the first to win two at different schools (LSU in 2003).  Running back Mark Ingram is the second player (Matt Leinart) to win the Heisman Trophy and the BCS championship in the same season, and just the second running back (Tony Dorsett) in the Poll Era to win the Heisman and any kind of championship in the same year.

The game was a little closer than the final score would indicate.  Alabama started slow and made a serious early mistake when they threw up an interception on an fake punt attempt, but the defense limited Texas to just two field goals.  Alabama woke up and took over and was ready to go into the locker room with a 17-6 halftime lead, but with the seconds winding down in the first half, Texas tried a little shuttle pass.  The receiver showed off his juggling skills until Alabama lineman Marcell Dareus snatched it and ran 28 yards for the score.

The play gave Alabama a 24-6 halftime lead and almost cost them the game.  They came out flat in the second half and let Texas's high-powered offense cut the lead to just three.  Another great Alabama defensive play settled it.  Linebacker Eryk Anders got a blindside sack on freshman QB Garrett Gilbert.  The ball came loose and Courtney Upshaw recovered it on the Texas three.  Three plays later, Ingram punched it in to get the lead back to ten.  Alabama got another turnover and scored another last-minute touchdown.  Kicker Leigh Tiffin capped a record-setting career at Alabama by missing the extra point for the 16-point win.

Sports Update

Baseball -- the Braves and the pennant races

I was trying to stay up-to-date with the Atlanta Braves, but grew disgusted with them.  In my last update, the Braves were on their way to Florida to begin a four-game set with the Marlins.  They were tied with the Marlins for second place in the NL East and in good shape in the NL wildcard race.  They took the first two games of that series and life was good.  Then they lost the third game on a late home run and got blown out in the fourth game.  The slide continued with the Cincinnati Reds sweeping the Braves in a three-game series at home.  That made five losses in a row and things looked pretty dismal.  But the Braves are trying to salvage something.  They went back on the road and took two out of three from the Astros and three straight from the Cardinals.

But the days are dwindling down to a precious few.  There are just 19 games left and the Braves are pretty much where they were at the beginning of the month as far as the division standings -- they're in third place, 7 1/2 games behind the Phillies.  They've lost ground in the wildcard race though -- they're now in fourth place, 6 1/2 games behind the Rockies.  The good news is that the remaining games are all against NL East opponents.  The bad news is that they've got to win most of them and the Phillies or the Rockies are going to have to have a terrible swoon.  The Braves open up a three-game series against the Mets Tuesday evening.

Overall, the baseball season has been a drag if you like close races.  The Los Angeles Dodgers are holding onto a three game lead over the Rockies in the NL West, and that's about the closest thing we have to a pennant race.  The Phillies lead the Marlins by 6 1/2 in the NL East.  The Cardinals, even after the sweep by the Braves, lead the Cubs by 9 1/2 in the NL Central.  In the American League, the Yankees lead Boston by seven in the East, the Tigers lead the Twins by 5 1/2 in the Central and the Angels lead the Rangers by six in the West.  The wildcard races are a little closer -- Boston leads Texas by four in the AL, and the Rockies lead the Giants by 4 1/2 in the NL.

College Football -- the SEC

Quote of the Day

"Was that a 60-minute game, or what? It came down to the last play, and we made it."

-- Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Farrior

Sports Stories

A few sports stories that caught my eye while I was trying to decide if Atlanta really has a pro basketball team...

The only people who seem to be doing great in this dismal economy are Wall Street executives, lottery winners and baseball players. Among the latter, Rafael Furcal might be returning to the Atlanta Braves. The shortstop is mulling over a $30 million, three-year deal. Then again, he may go to the Athletics or stay with the Dodgers. Who knows at this point?

Charles Barkley ripped his alma mater, Auburn, for hiring Gene Chizik to be their head football coach. He would have preferred Turner Gill, head coach of the University of Buffalo, and says the only reason they didn't hire Gill is that he is black. Gill has since signed a contract extention at Buffalo.

Contrary to what Tim Tebow said after the Heisman presentation, Florida coach Urban Meyer says that offensive coordinator Dan Mullen will stay on at Florida long enough to call the plays for Gators in the BCS national championship game. Mullen has been hired to fill the head coaching vacancy at Mississippi State.

Accidents and spins were at their lowest levels in five years in NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series. There were 211 incidents that resulted in a caution flag in 2008, down 12% from the previous year.

And Michael Vick's attorney told a federal bankruptcy judge that Vick could be out of jail and in a Virginia halfway house by late January.

It Sucks to Be a Falcons Fan

I used to be a big NFL fan. Now? Not so much. I'm not sure what changed. I think the game got a little too sanitized. Too many games in climate-controlled domes, not enough in the rain, sleet and snow. Then again, it may have just been one too many Peter Gent books.

I used to watch anything and everything that involved a football. Now I stick to the college game (mainly the SEC) and the local pro teams. Here, in the Chattanooga metro area, we're halfway between two teams -- the Atlanta Falcons and the Tennessee Titans. I follow the Titans and try to keep up with what's going on there, but they've never really been my team. That's Houston's team. The owner, Bud Adams, tried to extort all he could get from the people of Houston. Then, when they weren't ready to give him anything and everything, bolted for the greener pastures in Tennessee. Not exactly a rousing tradition to get behind. I've always been a Falcons fan and it's mostly been just like following the Braves. Both teams have long histories of losing and under-achievement with momentary flashes of greatness. The Falcons made it to the one Super Bowl (XXXIII - where they lost to the Denver Broncos 34-19.) Other than that, it's been pretty bad. After several mediocre and sometimes miserable decades, the Braves finally got their act together and put together a record-breaking string of division championships, but they only have the one championship (in 1995) to show for it all. I guess that's the mark of a true fan -- one that will follow a team throughout an excruciating history in the hope that better days will one day come.

That's where things stand with the Falcons now. Monday and Tuesday were the darkness. I can only hope that the future is so bright I've gotta wear shades. It certainly can't get any worse. Can it? Early Monday we learned the fate of Michael Vick, who looked for a brief moment like the shining star that was finally going to lead the Falcons to the promised land. 23 months in jail. Incarcerated until at least the summer of 2009. And he certainly deserves it too. The very next day, Bobby Petrino, the Falcons coach who was brought in from the University of Louisville to fine tune Vick's quarterbacking skills, bolted the sinking ship thirteen games into a sixteen-game season. He's headed to the University of Arkansas, leaving the 3-10 Vick-less Falcons in the lurch.

I can only hope Vick uses the time in prison to reflect on the promise lost and begins the long effort to turn his life around. He can be a success story on and off the field, but he's got a long row to hoe. It's certainly going to take a lot to convince the general public that he's a changed man. Some people won't be convinced no matter what. He'll be 30 years old in 2009. That's approaching old age in the NFL. He'll be down to his last shot. It probably won't happen with the Falcons and might not happen at the quarterback position.

Bobby Petrino, like a lot of other great college coaches (think Spurrier), was out of his element in the pro game. He never got control of the team and the sniping from the bench has been going on all season. His loudest critic has been cornerback DeAngelo Hall, a teammate of Vick's at Virginia Tech. Their feud got off to a good start in the third game of the season. The Falcons were leading Carolina 17-10, when Hall drew a pass interference penalty, then an unnecessary roughness penalty to keep a Carolina drive alive. The Falcons finally got a sack to end the drive, but Hall and Carolina wide receiver Steve Smith were mouthing off as the teams were heading off the field. Hall drew the penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct and the drive continued anew. Carolina, thanks to the three penalties, scored a touchdown to tie the game. It was the turning point; Carolina won 27-20 and the Falcons were 0-3 at that point. That was bad enough, but the TV audience and the fans at the stadium also got to see a shouting match on the sideline between Hall and Petrino and another coach. Hall had to be restrained by three other players and was fined $100,000 later that week. Later in the season, it got so bad that the Falcons couldn't sell out their home games and avoid the TV blackouts. And that was counting all the season tickets that were sold before the s--t hit the fan. Tuesday was the final nail in the coffin.

So where do we go from here? Assistant coach Emmitt Thomas, who's been in the league for 41 years as a player and a coach, has been named the interim head coach. He'll bail like crazy and try to keep the ship afloat over the final three games. Then owner Arthur Blank needs to do what Ted Turner once did for the Braves -- find the best coach available (Bill Cowher?) and give him a dump truck full of money or whatever it takes to get him to Atlanta, then get out of the way and let the football people run the team.

They say that it's darkest before the dawn. It's pretty damned dark in Atlanta these days.