Backwards K
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... whereas, with Kesling ...I listened to almost every Tennessee game Mooney called. I was young, but never impressed with him as our announcer. Often he failed to identify the accurate distance of each play. My father would draw his own “Bill Dyer” Dyer Gram and often had to erase previous plays to correct Mooneys inaccurate calls. He seldom had that problem with Nelson or Ward.
I was a Junior at Lynn View in Kingsport.... Those were the days...Lots of memories brought back. One game that I didn’t see listed —the Rosebonnet Bowl in Memphis 1965. Vols 37 UCLA 34. A cold dreary DEC day in Liberty Bowl Stadium. Vols were going to Bluebonnet Bowl in Houston and UCLA was Rose Bowl bound. Dewey “Swamp Rat” Warren scored winning TD on QB keeper barely getting into end zone late in 4th quarter. UCLA coach Prothro had grown up in Memphis and was upset over officiating. Said after the game he was ashamed to be a Southerner. Our safety Bobby Petrella had INT on last play of game and was either hit by someone coming off UCLA bench or tackled into their sideline and slugged. That was my first away game as Vol fan/I was a young pup 10 years old.
BTW.........
There have been much bigger wins in UT history, but the win over Notre Dame in 1979 was HUGE at the time. We forget how big that was!
I loved Jimmy Streater before this game, but he became a legend after this win!
My first Vol heartbreak was the 1968 Orange bowl against Oklahoma. Karl Kremser, one of the first kickers that (the term they used was "soccer style kicker") missed a game winning, exciting, and noble come from behind attempt.. Now every kicker kicks that way, but it was an anomaly in those days. Then later we advanced to the barefoot kicker Ricky Townsend, who was pretty cool, running downfield on a kickoff with a shoe off. George Hunt was the last head on kicker I remember. Also, one of the most bad ass players ever was George Cafego. I think, if he played in the modern era, he would compare to Eric Berry. He was a guy that landed here from West Virginia and played on Neyland's '38 team (20 years before I was born). He was part of that historic team that SHUT OUT, every team during the regular season. That's right - they went to the Rose Bowl and up to that point, nobody had scored on them AT ALL.
During the Major's era, Cafego was the kicking coach. I worked as a waiter/dishwasher in Gibb's on the training table back in the mid-late '70s and Cafego would come in with the rest of the staff. I got to talk to Majors a couple of times, but Cafego was quiet. One of my biggest regrets was that I didn't approach him and strike up a conversation with him.
This is kinda bad, but I went to a Halloween party in Reese Hall with a bunch of the Gibbs waiters. One guy came as Cafego because ol' George was born with a sagging eye socket. Could have been from a football injury (makes more sense), but anyway the guy put some tape on his face to pull the skin down and that was his costume. One piece of tape. Kind of disrespectful, I'll admit, but after a keg of beer, we laughed and laughed.
OK, I googled the WWW and found a reference from a past thread talking about George's eye. This came from VOLNATION. Seems a Vandy guy blinded him in a pile.
Coach Cafego Speeches
It being Vandy week I've been attempting to find some audio of some Coach Cafego speeches on Vandy. So far I'm coming up empty. Anyone know where to find some?www.volnation.com
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Ticked me off that he never acknowledged that respect given to him. No wave to the crowd or anything. I was sitting in section KK row 2 and it was obvious what the crowd in the south end zone was doing.And Neyland Stadium gave the The Bear a standing O when he walked out on the field prior to kick off. I’ll never forget it . It was pure class by our fans and then we thumped them, stormed the field and carried the goal posts to The Strip. Proud to be a Tennessee Volunteer! GBO.
I was sitting in the west side upper deck and it appeared that Holloway was just throwing the ball away to no one in the back of the eastern side of the end zone. Then all of a sudden these two hands came out of no where and stretched for the catch. One of the most miraculous plays of my lifetime. The stadium went nuts. To anyone sitting in that stadium it was divine intervention.It certainly didn't feature one of our best teams, but the 1974 come-from-behind victory over Clemson (29-28) is worth taking a look at. The winning 2-point conversion pass from the Artful Dodger to Larry Sievers was one of the most spectacular, jaw-dropping plays in Tennessee football history. See 1974 Clemson vs. Tennessee - Google Search