BYE WEEK = Who was Tennessee’s quarterback when you became a Tennessee fan?

Peyton. I was a huge college football fan but didn't like the Vols until I started going to school there, which was Peyton's senior year. By the time we played my prior favorite team in the SEC Championship that year I was hooked on a brighter shade of orange and all Vol!
 
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I was 9 when we won the natty so I didn't really understand the significance or football really. So I won't say Tee. When I first really remember actually getting in to it... probably Casey Clausen.
 
I think I’ll be the only one teeing up this name - Randy Wallace. I didn’t become a fan until the day I set foot on campus as a freshman in 1975. But I went all in. Survived four years of no bowl games and a 22-22-1 record during my education.
 
OK, those of you who would dare lump me in with the whippersnappers, read this for meaning - I lived in several states and even more cities while growing up, but never in Tennessee. By the time that I graduated from my second high school, I'd been at it for just under six years. I applied to numerous colleges, was always accepted, but arranging the financing was difficult. In the Winter of 74, I'd been out of high school for awhile and worried that I wasn't going to be able to start come Fall term. My father told me he was going to take a job in Nashville, so I applied to UT. Not only did UT accept me, they committed to the financial aid that I needed by the end of April and threw in $500 from the general scholarship fund. I was going to college! I saw the campus for the first time the day I arrived to register for Fall term, 1974. I didn't know a soul, but quickly made friends and took turns waiting in line for student tickets. I believe that the first Vols game I attended was versus Kansas, and the electric QB was Condredge Holloway. I became a fan for life.

In the decades since graduating from UT in the Spring of 1979, I've seen more Vols games in other places than in Neyland stadium. There's a special camaraderie among traveling Vols fans, and it is in my marrow. In special appreciation for UT giving me the wherewithal to attend, I've earmarked my annual gifts to the University for the general scholarship fund.

Forever Orange!
GBO.
 
The Swamp Rat. Later I would interview him for a feature when he was the coach at Copper Basin High School in Copperhill. Walked into the interview blind and got the shakes when I saw his name on the desk. GBO.

The Swamp Rat. Later I would interview him for a feature when he was the coach at Copper Basin High School in Copperhill. Walked into the interview blind and got the shakes when I saw his name on the desk. GBO.
Bad memories. We lost COACH Eddie Ledford in a car accident on the Ocoee river road. HE, I almost said replaced but he couldn’t hold the MANS jock.
 

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