Ah.

Here we are my good friends. We came. We saw. We conquered. I would congratulate UT on a hard fought game, but you would think that I was being sarcastic and poking fun.

Anyway, myself and the Ghost of Neyland sat down separately and did a live game log. This is how it turned out. Pretty interesting (and entertaining) the different viewpoints from the lopsided Bama win.

GoN: 10:47 - Got folks coming, Tennessee and Alabama fans - need pizza. I live 30 minutes away from Papa Johns. I don’t like the prospect of this, but people gotta eat.

GoN: 11:14 - Waiting for pizza and beyond pissed. Get a text from my source that Antoine Caldwell, Glen Coffee, Marlon Davis, Marquis Johnson and Chris Rogers have been suspended for institutional violations involving textbooks? You mean they use those in Bama? It’s not quite the “Hand of God” fumble, but we’ll take it.

GoN: 11:17 - Call Boomtown to tell him the news and he doesn’t seem concerned at all. I’m a little irritated I didn’t ruin his pregame preparations.

BM: 11:17 Ghost just called me. Apparently we have 5 players (including starters Antoine Caldwell, Marlon Davis, and Glen Coffee) suspended for “illegal receipt of textbooks.” Great. No danger of anything like that happening at UT, unless you can illegally receive coloring books.

GoN: 11:19 - FINALLY got my pizza, and I’m 30 minutes from home. This may be where the diary ends. I’m going to funnel Tony Stewart on the backroads. I could die.

GoN: 11:33 - Making progress on the road but they’re going to kick off without me. I’m two miles away, guys. Please wait. They’d never let this happen in Knoxville. People know me. I’m kind of a big thing. I’m terribly disappointed in Tuscaloosa. They’ll hear from my publicist.

GoN: 11:33 - Onsides kick!! Oh my Lord! What is going on? I need to go to the bathroom already. Speed: 91 mph. Now, a seventeen-yard pass to DJ Hall. Hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.

BM: 11:33 Onside kick. Wow. I hope Saban isn’t doing this out of a sense of desperation. (See Alabama-Oklahoma 2002, when we could have beaten those guys straight up without all the tricks. Thanks Fran!)

GoN: 11:36 - I’m busting in with the pizza and see two Bammers - Run in the Mud and my father in law - on my couch. I’d envisioned ways for this game to start, many ways. This wasn’t on the list.

GoN: 11:37 - Leigh Tiffin nails a field goal. These two teams are a combined 9-0 when they score first. Guess this theory will be tested.

BM: 11:37 ………..and we score a field goal. That’s ok. It’s points. We’ll take it.

GoN: 11:41 - Bama kickoff isn’t onsides. That’s a start.

BM: 11:42 The UT starting lineup coverage just reminded me again that Lucas Taylor is their best wide receiver. The second guy? Some white kid named Austin. How in the world is UT’s passing game so good?

BM: 11:43 Ouch. Bad news for Alabama. Ezekiel Knight was just injured on a leg whip from a UT offensive lineman. Imagine that. Those crazy kids.

BM: 11:44 Simeon Castille actually gets to the QB on a corner blitz! I am stunned. Simeon had a fabulous year in ‘06 but I just get the feeling he isn’t as good as everyone thinks.

GoN: 11:46 - Well, the crowd is loud and Bama is getting pressure on Ainge. There goes those keys. Please GOD let the Vols punt out of bounds. Whew.

BM: 11:50 D.J. just got loose deep. UT is aware that he is out best player, right? He already has 3 catches for 70 yards and I haven’t even gotten comfortable in my lazy boy yet.

GoN: 11:51 - Hall absolutely abuses Brent Vinson. Hall is at least gimpy on the sideline. Vols to the Wall sighs deeply beside me.

BM: 11:52 How good is this makeshift offensive line thus far? Good gracious. Terry Grant (all 185 pounds of him) is flat blowing people up in the backfield and JPW looks like he actually IS comfortable in his lazy boy. A 10-0 start would be golden.

BM: 11:53 What the crap? We just drew UT offsides by putting the LT and LG in motion. LOL!

GoN: 11:53 - Tennessee jumps offside on fourth-and-inches, even though Bama clearly had an illegal formation, too, it isn’t called. Ridiculous. We’re gonna have to play Bama and the officials, it’s clear.

BM: 11:56 3rd and goal. JPW overthrows an open receiver in the end zone. What else is new. Whoops. UT roughed the passer. You have to love bail out penalties like that.

GoN: 11:56 - Roughing the passer on Dan Williams. Come ON Dan!! Huge, huge mistake.

BM: 11:59 Play action pass to Terry Grant for the touchdown. JPW’s action skills will never going be confused with Peyton Manning. A blind man wouldn’t haven fallen for that fake. Still 10-0 is very nice.

GoN: 11:59 - Touchdown Terry Grant. That play-action looked like a steaming pile of dogcrap, and the Vols were statues. I love John Chavis. All of a sudden, I’m not hungry. This is like Tom Brady saying he’s tired at bedtime.

BM: 12:04 UT is putting together a nice drive here. I guess it’s still a bit early for them to roll over for us.

BM: 12:05 Oh my goodness. Arian Foster just faked the jock right off of Simeon Castille. Where is last year’s Foster? He looks just as big, but is moving like he is 20 pounds lighter.

GoN: 12:06 - We’re driving, and I said, “Arian Foster has good football speed.” That’s like saying, “Bless his heart.” Pass interference on Bama on third down. A TD and we’re back in it. Foster really does look great.

BM: 12:08 Simeon gets called for pass interference on 3rd and goal, providing UT with a bail out play to call their own. Simeon is making my argument for me right now. Which is exactly NOT what I wanted.

GoN: 12:09 Thank you, Simeon. Now, go punch a teammate.

BM: 12:10 Foster just ran through the tackle of Alabama MLB Darren Mustin. We may have a McFadden situation on our hands folks. How are we going to stop this guy? 10-7.

GoN: 12:10 - TOUCHDOWN Foster! Back in it, baby. Silence from the lepers.

BM: 12:12 The worst thing ever just happened. I lost satellite signal. I am to far out in the sticks for effective rabbit ears. I can’t even get our radio broadcast, but I can see a half dozen deer building a tree house in my back yard. That makes this totally worth it.

BM: 12:19. Ok. We are back. Apparently while I was gone, Phil Fulmer decided to make like an idiot and kick to Javier Arenas. Is he trying to give us this game on a silver platter? You don’t mess with Hibachi’s little cousin Toshiba……er something like that.

BM: 12:21.………….and we miss the field goal. You can feel the momentum slipping a little bit.

GoN: 12:25 - A throwback to Foster!!! Touchdown UT to take the lead! But they call it back on a block in the back when an Alabama player turns his back running into the end zone. Hosed again! That’s unbelievable. Even the Bammers at my house can’t believe it.

BM: 12:25 Wow. They just went wheel route on us Shaun Alexander style. TD UT. 10-14. The momentum is………wait a second. Some dummy UT player blocked in the back on a play that needed nothing but hands raised in the air and thuggish trash talking (if you ask Danny Ainge’s nephew.) Maybe we can mitigate the damage here and get out with just a FG.

BM: 12:29 TD Tennessee. Some big white dude (obviously a TE) was wide open for the score. I hate white people. They took our lands and now are scoring touchdowns against my team.

GoN: 12:29 - Play-action rollout to Luke Stocker. Who’s Luke Stocker? Oh yeah, one of our white tight ends. Vols lead. Palpatations settling. We got this, yo.

BM: 12:30 So here is where we are………….UT took our best shot early and has come back like gangbusters. We can’t tackle Foster, and Ainge has proved to be very effective against us as opposed to last year. We have to get some stops. I was thinking this would be more of a defensive struggle given Fulmer’s propensity to go conservative in this game, and our bad offense. It will take 31 points to win this game.

GoN: 12:32 - JPW fumbles but gets on it and blunders forward for the first down. If this is how it’s going to go all day, UT is in trouble. STOP THEM, DADGUMMIT!

GoN: 12:35 - Is this the End Days?? They just flashed the Vandy 17, SC 0 score. Holy crap! Next week, my trip to Knoxville suddenly doesn’t look so appealing. Oh well, the Cocks will come back.

BM: 12:37 Terry Grant rips off a huge run. The Warrick Dunn comparison is so obvious. Power runner for a little guy. Great speed. Not as shifty as you would think. He isn’t exactly what Saban is looking for, but will be impossible to keep off the field for the next 4 years.

BM: 12:43 DJ Hall just went over 100 yards in this game. He is currently on pace for 28 catches and 412 yards. What is Tennessee doing?!?

BM: 12:48 3rd and goal from the 20 after the inevitable personal foul on Justin Britt. (Just kidding Justin! Please don’t try and find me!) JPW does like Brett Favre and makes a great throw to DJ for the touchdown. Wilson is absolutely on fire. I have decided to let white folks back into my good graces for now. 17-14.

GoN: 12:48 - Unreal! I HATE John Chavis! Third-and-goal from Anniston and Bama scores a touchdown. Um, guys. That’s DJ HALL. He’s an OK receiver. May want to friggin guard him!! Bama leads 17-14. I hate the world. I swear that me and Vols to the Wall could guard DJ better than this.

BM: 12:53 How about the star power in the Alabama booth? Namath and Stabler. Wonder who did the best with the ladies back in the day? Joe, Ken, or Eli?

BM: 12:57 Rashad Johnson just DRILLED Lucas Taylor. He has now become my player most likely to have a NFL career based almost exclusively on the tutoring of Nick Saban. He might be the best player on our defense.

BM: 12:59 ALABAMA GETS A STOP! I had forgotten what that looked like after watching this game for so long. Defense does indeed exist gents. First team to figure that out wins this game.

GoN: 12:59 - Tennessee punts on fourth-and-1 from midfield. Stuff like this gets you BEAT, Fulmer. I bet Saban wouldn’t have done it. Maybe these aren’t the two worst defenses on the planet. Well, UT is.

GoN: 1:02 - Bama converts on EVERY third down. The cushion UT is giving up, I simply can’t describe this. We’re in full-Florida mode. It’s like watching 11 donkeys screwing a jukebox.

GoN: 1:09 - Bama going for it on fourth down, and getting it. See Fulmer. Told ya. Bama playing to win. UT playing not to lose. Just like the old days.

BM: 1:09 4th and 1 and we are going for it. I love the aggressiveness, it gives the players confidence. We came back out in that crazy shifting formation and this time ran a play out of it. Genius. Apparently it’s called the Syracuse shift. It must have been named after something that happened up there long long ago.

BM: 1:13 That pass interference call was huge. UT continues to shoot themselves in the foot. They have 8 penalties already.

GoN: 1:13 - Phantom pass interference call on UT in the end zone. I hate Alabama and SEC officials. Seriously, this HAS NOT been fair. Chuckles from the lepers.

GoN: 1:14 - Hall pushes off and scores a touchdown. No flag. Gee, that’s hard to believe. The refs are changing the game by themselves. I call Boomtown to say the same thing. He starts to argue. I hang up. We could never watch a game together. I’d shiv him in the side when he wasn’t looking. 24-14 Bama.

BM: 1:14 Touchdown Alabama on my new favorite play. Throwing to the WR’s back shoulder should just be illegal. It is impossible to stop. 24-14

BM: 1:14 Ghost just called. He has already decided two things. A) They are probably going to lose. B) He has already decided to blame it on the refs. Cry me a river. I hope we drill these guys.

BM: 1:20 Rashad Rashad Rashad. That was a bad call, but you can’t put yourself in that position. Nick Saban is about to literally explode. I don’t like our chances if that happens. FG UT. 24-17

GoN 1:20 - Big, big field goal by the Vols heading into the half. Thank you, late hit. “‘Scuse my language,” Saban says after a slip to the TV. Hard to hate that guy, but I think I can handle it. He’s a comic book character. 24-17 at the break. Got em where we want em.

BM: 1:22 Just how ticked is Nick Saban? The guy just cursed on a halftime interview….LOL. I wouldn’t really want to be in that locker room.

BM: Halftime Great offensive first half for my Tide. We are going to have to keep it up in a big way this second half if we don’t figure out how to stop UT.

GoN: Halftime - Father-in-law just left to go home. Guess he’s sick of the fussing and whining. We tend to do that during games. Meanwhile, I don’t like the feel of this game. Really. Self-combustion is certainly in the Vols’ past.

BM: 1:42 Second half is starting. I would like to go for the kill immediately.

BM: 1:44 …………….or a 3 and out. Either way guys.

GoN: 1:44 WE HAVE STOPPED ALABAMA ON THE SECOND HALF OPENING DRIVE!! A room applauds.

GoN: 1:46 - Thank GOD it’s ruled an incomplete pass on some unfathomable “trick” play involving Kenny O’Neal. OK, rant time. When Kenny O’Neal plays an average of three snaps a game and he trots in EVERYBODY WATCHING THE GAME AND EVERYBODY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FIELD KNOWS HE’S TOUCHING THE BALL!! Cut, what part of this do you not understand???? At least now I understand why O’Neal never sees the field.

GoN: 1:48 - Why, why, why aren’t we running the football? They can’t stop Ainge. This is as inexplicable as Shula not running Johns in the second half against us last year.

BM: 1:48 UT is driving. We still can’t tackle Foster. We need someone to step up, sooner rather than later.

BM: 1:51 Who would have ever believed it? A true freshman corner bait the NFL caliber senior QB into throwing a pick. You have to be excited about a kid like that. It isn’t always the 5 star players (Berry and Vinson) that ultimately make the difference.

GoN: 1:51 - Wow! Kareem Jackson baits Ainge and intercepts him. Great, great play. That kid’s a freshman. This is a killer. All of a sudden, I think we’re going to lose for the first time. Jugular play. The yell from my living room reaches seismographic proportions.

GoN: 1:56 - So, let me get this straight: The play clock conveniently goes out on a no-huddle UT team then mysteriously flickers back on when Bama gets the ball. Interesting. I love technology.

BM: 1:58 LOL. Alabama is driving (again) and UT picks up a crucial pass interference call on third down (again.) Apparently, the UT strategy for covering our WR’s in the second half will continue to be based around the concept of pass interference. Maybe this is the last time they will be caught.

GoN: 1:58 - Pass interference on Tennessee!! What?? Where?? The officials are blowing this game for Tennessee. Cussword! Cussword! (I’m concentrating on not saying them, so I’m yelling out “cussword” instead.

GoN: - Tiffin with another FG. Down 10 to the Crimson Black-and-White-Striped Tide.

BM: 2:02 Tiffin kicks a short FG. We are letting them kind of hang around.

BM: 2:09 Next on my list of things never to see again? John Chavis without his shirt.

BM: 2:12 We just stopped UT again. You get the feeling that this game is slipping away from the Vols and that they know it.

GoN: 2:12 - Third and 2 and we don’t give it to Foster again. Punting again. Game over, in my opinion.

GoN: - Hey look, DJ Hall caught a ball. Finally. I’m going to go stick a revolver in my chin. DJ Hall’s 12^th catch by picking up 30 yards. All-American against an All-Industrial-Sized-Bag-of-Poo defense.

BM: 2:16 DJ Hall gets open again. This has gone from awesome to funny to kind of sad. This was the gameplan?

BM: 2:20 So we are still trying to give the UT fans some hope. (I think the players know this is over.) We kick the FG to go up 30-17. UT could still comeback of course, but I think that is in theory only.

GoN: 2:21 - Vinson blows a clear interception that leads to three more Bama points. 30-17 Tide. Things don’t look good to say the least.

BM: 2:27 Time to head to the fourth quarter. Let’s finish strong and leave no doubt.

GoN: 2:28- Great pressure by McClain on Ainge on third down. He’s a beast. Yep, we’re gonna lose.

BM: 2:32 Roy Upchurch just ripped off a huge gain on a screen pass. UT has no clue defensively right now. I wonder if we could find a spot for Chief on our staff since he is such good friends with Steele?

GoN: 2:34 - Vols in full-quit mode like Florida. Didn’t think they quit in that game, but by watching this one, I see I was wrong. Piss.

GoN: 2:35 - Oh well. Can’t talk crap anymore about JPW. What a game. Need to start gearing up to fire Chavis and Fulmer. Bama is imposing its will on us play after play. I never saw this coming. There are a lot of MVPs in crimson today. Color me impressed.

GoN: 2:40 - Terry Grant just broke our backs. And Vandy beat South Carolina! Wow! I really wish I could care.

BM: 2:40 Draw play to Terry Grant for the touchdown. Two point version is obviously good. I really just can’t believe DJ Hall caught the conversion. I am dumbfounded.

BM: 2:45 Kareem Jackson just made another AA caliber play. Can you believe this kid was headed to Vandy? Maybe this kid is our best defensive back.

GoN: 2:46 - Total silence.

GoN: 2:48 - Ainge throws it out of bounds on fourth down. Huh? I wish I understood. The play started with a terrible, terrible snap. Way to rally the troops, guys. Good gameplan.

BM: 2:55 Xavier Mitchell is not handling this blowout very well. A personal foul is no way to voice your displeasure with the results, Xavier. Fulmer just blasted him though. Maybe UT’s coach isn’t such a bad guy after all. I say we keep him around.

GoN: 2:55 - Xavier Mitchell late hits JPW when he had one of, oh, I don’t know three stops all day. Fulmer is chewing Mitchell a new butthole, and he deserves it. Good for Phil. Maybe next year, he’ll be a good motivational speaker. Bama lost two starting offensive linemen before the game, and UT gets no sacks. If officials need any reason to fire Chavis, read the last sentence. Oh, and look at the Florida and Bama scores.

BM: 2:58 Another FG for ‘Bama. It’s 41-17 and Rammer Jammer must be coming soon.

GoN: 2:59 - Tiffin hits another field goal where Bear farts and blows it inside the crossbar when it hits the upright. Personifies the day. 41-17. I don’t know what to say other than congratulations, Alabama.

BM: 3:03 UT punts. The white flag is officially raised. Congratulations to my team for the victory!

GoN: 3:06 - Total silence, basically for the rest of the afternoon.

BM: 3:10 Kareem Jackson just got another pick thus cementing himself to the freshman All-SEC team. That kid is a big part of our future.

BM: 3:11 Rammer Jammer never sounded so sweet.

Boomtown Madman and Ghost of Neyland

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