Bob Woodruff, Joe Paterno, and the lights at Neyland

Former Tennessee Athletic Director Bob Woodruff was a crafty old dude. I had the privilege to interview him in his office during my undergraduate years at UT as part of a journalism project. I was researching the plans (that were never fulfilled) to retrofit the south end of Neyland Stadium so that the Vols basketball team could play a few selected home games there. This was the mid-1970s when Bernard King, Ernie Grunfeld and Co. were lighting up men’s hoops like a bonfire. The old Stokely Athletic Center was not big enough to hold the excitement of those days. All-night lines for student tickets were becoming commonplace, especially for the big games like Kentucky (that 103-98 war remains the best basketball game at any level I’ve ever witnessed in person).

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Another Reason to Hate CBS Sports and ESPN

Nothing is sacred anymore.

Campaign to Fill Neyland Stadium

Now that former Vol Ball Head Coach Bruce Pearl has taken a job as V.P. of Marketing for Knoxville-based H.T. Hackney, I am consumed with an idea…

The Sound and the Fury

Oregon 48  Tennessee 13

11 Sep 2010 | Neyland Stadium | 102,035

Recap | Boxscore | Play-by-play | Drive Chart

With 8:53 left in the first quarter, a good old-fashioned late-summer thunderstorm unleashed its sound and fury. That was just after the Vols and their fans in a floodlit Neyland Stadium unleashed their own sound and fury to ruffle the Ducks’s feathers for a quick 6-0 lead. One hour and 10 minutes later, following a mandated safety break due to lightening, the sound and fury of Vol football in the house that a General built resumed in front of a full-throated Volunteer party that reached its apex with the Vols ahead 13-3 just after the first quarter break.

The Announcement of Doug’s Rug

Tom Mattingly’s post of today on his blog The Vol Historian is a great reminder of how different communications were 42 years ago.

And that was a d*mn good answer :)

So the TV crew is interviewing fans during pre-game festivities about their thoughts on the Tennessee / Vanderbilt rivalry.   A gentleman dressed in black and gold made the following comment:

” the Vandy UT rivalry is all about pride. And about what is best for Tennessee.. and shows the best for Tennesse”

And a gentleman dressed in Orange standing next to him replied:

“And that was a damn good answer”

So What’s a Game at Neyland Like?

Today we say so long to yet another season of football played at Neyland Stadium.

You know what it’s all about.

I know what it’s all about.

The Color Orange

But, have you ever been approached by someone who has never been to a game in Knoxville and is interested in knowing what it’s like? Do you just get all babbly and googly and teary-eyed, and just end up saying, “well, you just have to go and be there for the experience“?

I did just that to a friend in California, a Cal alum, and he ended up going to the Cal-Tennessee game played at Neyland in 2006. He came back all babbly and googly and teary-eyed from the experience, even though his school got soundly thrashed. He told all his friends back in the Bay Area that didn’t go that they should have, because it would have been nothing like they had ever experienced.

So the next time you get the question, send them to this great article in two parts written by freelance writer and editor Eric Angevine who lives in Charlottesville, VA. He is a frequent contributor to ESPN.com and the editor of the college basketball Web site StormingTheFloor.net.

For that matter, this is a must read even if you’ve been to a hundred games at Neyland.

Then both of you can get all babbly and googly and teary-eyed just from the read.