OneManGang
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Tennessee vs The Maxims vs Austin Peay
DATE: 9 September 2023
PLACE: Neyland Stadium
ATTENDANCE: 101,915
FINAL SCORE: Tennessee 30 Austin Peay13
Tennessee honored Vol legend Condredge Holloway before the game.
Last week I wrote, “No offense @peaygolf, but the Vols could start Navy Shuler on Saturday and still win by 20.” I apologize, my friend. On further review, maybe starting Shuler might not have been such a bad idea!
Packer legend Jerry Kramer kept a diary during the 1967 season which culminated in a Green Bay victory in Super Bowl II. This diary was published under the title Instant Replay and became a best-seller.
As Green Bay prepared to face a lesser opponent, Kramer wrote that he hated games like that, “If you win big you look like a bully. If you lose you look like a dummy.”
Somehow, Our Beloved Vols managed to do BOTH Saturday.
Stray voltage:
SEC officials AT THEIR WORST are light years better than ACC refs. Dear Lord, can you imagine being in the ACC and having that tribe of idiots calling EVERY game? Notre Dame, which is technically independent but plays an ACC schedule, pays to have PAC-10 refs call their games. Now we know why. Note to AD White: the only way an ACC ref should ever be in Neyland Stadium from now on is to buy a ticket.
As a team, Tennessee must be extraordinarily healthy – the Vol receivers couldn't catch a cold.
As the teams left the field after the game, I had visions of AP's #50 rolling down the field still trying to take out a defender's knee. He did it the entire game.
The Star Trek franchise has a plot device where various characters find themselves “out of phase” meaning they were there but not quite there. Saturday seemed to happen just that way.
Vol fans were ready to party. The win last week over Virginia and the Vols' return to the Top 10 provided all reasons to celebrate.
Then, as the mood built and the band started coming out on the field the Nervous Nellies ruled that because clouds were on the horizon it was necessary to postpone the game. For 30 minutes we were told there was lightning in the area. Now, the process of lighting strike produces a displacement of air that we call “thunder” that can be heard for miles. It stands to reason that if lightning is “in the vicinity” thunder would be heard. This writer didn't hear a single roll of thunder until about 10:30.
Either way, the crowd was distracted and then – the countdown clock for the kickoff started and that was it. No buildup, No pregame. No SSB. Just tee it up and go.
Personally, I don't give a Continental damn what they say, the networks and others would NEVER pull that sh*t with Ohio State, Michigan or USC.
Our University, its heritage and its traditions were disrespected and by The Almighty it is an outrage.
Now, I realize that our AD comes from a program with a history and heritage measured in hours, but still …
Be that as it may, Turbyville teed it up and buried the opening kickoff 9 yards deep in the endzone.
Tennessee stopped the Govs and had them 3rd and 11 on their own 33. The Peay punt team gathered on the sideline and then didn't come in. Instead Peay quarterback Mike DiLiello ran for 45 yards. It was an omen.
The Vols finally got them stopped and AP kicked a field goal.
Tennessee did absolutely nothing except not connect on easy throws and exchanged punts.
The Vols' second possession also ended in a punt but the AP fumbled and Tennessee was in business on the APSU 13. Annnddd it was more of the same and the Vols settled for a field goal.
Tennessee ended the quarter fourth-and-three with the ball on the APSU 17.
How bad was it? Well, at the end of the first quarter Tennessee had (and you may have seen this on the nightly accident report) ELEVEN yards passing.
End of 1st Quarter
Score:Tennessee 3 Austin Peay 3
The Vols couldn't convert with yet another incomplete pass.
Austin Peay then proceeded down the field and got yet another field goal.
After a promising start, the Vols stalled yet again and had to settle for a field goal.
Tennessee FINALLY got it offense in gear and began completing passes. However, those of us greybeardsin the crowd began to wonder if somehow John Majors had reappeared on the UT sideline as most of those passes were horizontal. During the Sunday night NFL broadcast, Chris Collinsworth said that a horizontal passing game indicated you are not blocking well. Take that as youwill.
The Vols capped a 67-yard drive with Joe doing the honors from six yards out.
End of 2nd Quarter
Score:Tennessee 13 Austin Peay 6
The Vols took the second half kick and marched down the field with Jalen Wright gaining the lion's share of the yards until Milton hit Keyton for a 5-yard touchdown.
Tennessee's second series again showed promise but ended when the refs decided to play defense and ruled that a Squirrel White catch on the one was incomplete. Campbell hit the field goal.
Note to the ACC refs: when 90-odd thousand people tell you you suck at your job after seeing the same replay you saw – you probably do.
Tennessee was driving again as the quarter ended but Keyton fumbled the ball on the APSU 18.
End of 3rd Quarter
Score: Tennessee 23 Austin Peay 6
Tennessee's woes didn't let up in the fourth canto.
Tennessee stopped the Govs' first drive with an interception – good.
Tennessee then went 3-and-out – bad.
The Govs then drove down and scored a touchdown – ugly.
Milton then tossed a horizontal pass to McCallen Castles that he turned into a 52-yard touchdown.
The Govs were unimpressed and then dinked and dunked their way down to the one when the Vols stuffed Diello on fourth down and that was that.
Final Score
Score: Tennessee 30 Austin Peay 13
*******
Captain Bob Lewis was upset.He had been flying B-29 number “82” for quite some time. Yes, he knew it was his commanding officer’s plane, but he’d been piloting it over the Empire and the CO hadn’t. Now as he came out on the ramp he saw that someone had seen fit to paint a name on it. “Who in Hell is that?” he demanded.
The crew chief piped up, “Sir, Enola Gay is the name of Col. Tibbets’ mother.”
“Oh.”
Tibbets recalled later, “I looked upon this airplane as one of the best B-29s ever built. I remember picking it out of the production line at the Martin factory in Omaha with the help of a couple of foremen.”
Now Tibbets, flying right seat and Lewis acting as co-pilot ran up the Enola Gay’s engines and peered down the runway on Tinian. Three weather planes had already departed Tinian to scout the three cities on today’s target list.Straight Flush, Jabbit III, and Full House wouldcheck on weather at Hiroshima, Kokura and Nagasaki then radio which had the clearest weather. Two other B-29s, The Great Artiste and one simply known as 91 would follow Enola Gay carrying observers and scientific instruments. It was 0240 on August 6, 1945. They released the brakes and the B-29 thundered down the packed coral runway. Tibbets used every inch of runway, indeed some observers feared the plane would plunge into the Pacific. Tibbets knew what he was doing though, and the plane clawed its way into the sky.
The previous afternoon, Enola Gay had been backed over a pit containing Little Boy. Little Boy differed from the device tested in New Mexico in that it used U-235 instead of plutonium to generate fission. Also its design differed. The plutonium devices were “implosion” weapons. In these, lenses of conventional explosives would be simultaneously detonated around a sphere of plutonium and a neutron source to cause a critical mass to form and an uncontrolled nuclear reaction to occur.
Little Boy used a different process. The nature of U-235 was such that if a sufficient amount (about 15 lbs) of it were brought together, an explosion would ensue. A simpler design could be used. In the Little Boy design, two masses of U-235 were separated by a six-foot cannon barrel. The smaller mass would be fired down the gun tube into the larger mass and a critical mass would form. On both weapons, proximity radars would precisely measure the distance from the ground, and at about 1900 feet the fuses would fire.
Co-pilot Lewis kept a diary of the mission at the request of Laurence Williams of the New York Times,the only reporter allowed to know of the Manhattan Project. He had also been present at the Trinity test and would fly as an observer on the Nagasaki mission. Williams had been sworn to secrecy and accepted on the provision that he would have THE scoop of the Second World War. He kept his word.
Captain David “Deak” Parsons, USN, and an assistant, Lt. Morris Jeppson, USA, waited until the bomber was 100 miles from Tinian and 4,000ft in the air. They then crawled into the bomb bay and inserted the main electrical fuse that would bring Little Boy to life. Parsons had practiced this so many times his fingers were bleeding. Tibbets offered to loan him some calf-skin gloves but Parsons refused, “I’ve got to be able to feel it.”
At 7:09 am local time the air raid sirens in Hiroshima went off. Overhead the Straight Flush droned along at 32,000’ unconcerned and unmolested. The Japanese air force was being preserved for use as kamikazes against the expected American invasion forces and Japanese anti-aircraft guns couldn’t accurately shoot that high. At 7:25 Enola Gay received a coded message from Straight Flush, “Advice: bomb primary.”
Hiroshima it was.
Hiroshima was a spread-out city on the islands of a river delta. At the apex of one of the central islandsis a landmark: the Aioi Bridge. The bridge is notable for its “T”shape. Bombardier Tom Ferebee, upon seeing it in recon photos proclaimed it “The perfect AP (Aiming Point). Ten miles out Ferebee looked through his bombsight and said “Okay, I’ve got the bridge.” 90 seconds from bomb release, Tibbets turned over control of the plane to Ferebee and his bombsight. Co-pilot Lewis wrote, rather jauntily, “There will now be a short intermission while we bomb the target.”
At 8:14:17 local time Ferebee tripped a toggle switch sending a tone through the crew’s head phones indicating 60 seconds to drop. At 8:15:17 Little Boy dropped free.
Tibbets immediately put Enola Gay into a 155-degree turn and a 60-degree bank to clear the target area. At 8:16 Hiroshima time, the gun fired, a small mass of U-235 shot down the cannon tube and as the two masses came together, a critical mass formed and released its energy.
Just as the physicists said it would.
A brilliant blue flash filled the planes, and an estimated 75,000 people on the ground simply ceased to exist.
Tibbets noted one other thing, “My teeth told me, more emphatically than my eyes, of the Hiroshima explosion. At the moment of the blast, there was a tingling sensation in my mouth and the very definite taste of lead upon my tongue. This, I was told later by scientists, was the result of electrolysis – an interaction between the fillings in my teeth and the radioactive forces loosed by the bomb.”
As the grey-purple mushroom cloud over Hiroshima surged upward, Bob Lewis made one last entry in his diary:
“MY GOD!”
The rest of the mission proceeded normally and Tibbets and the Enola Gay returned to Tinian.
Elsewhere in Hiroshima ten people left their shadows on the Yorozuyo Bridge. Their bodies were vaporized.
Private Shigeru Shimoyama, wandering around semi-stunned, came upon a pink horse. It tried to follow himbut lacked the strength. The blast had skinned it alive.
Twenty-two Americans, including several women being held as POWs were also killed in the blast. A twenty-third prisoner was pulled alive from the wreckage then killed by an angry mob of other survivors.
Still the military leaders of Japan would not countenance surrender. They directed the foreign Minister to continue courting the Russians to explore any opportunities for a negotiated settlement. Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov was non-commital. Zhukov’s forces were standing by.
On August 8th, another B-29, Bock’sCar, backed over the pit on Tinian and the plutonium bomb, nicknamed Fat Man was winched into the bomb bay. Maj. Chuck Sweeney was tapped to fly this mission.
After takeoff, it was discovered that a fuel pump had failed and 700 gallons of gas were not usable. The mission could have been scrubbed at that point but Sweeney decided to continue on, drop the bomb, then land on Okinawa. Later, weather planes found the primary target, Kokura, socked in with clouds. Sweeney tried several times to find a hole but couldn’t. Bock’s Car proceeded to Nagasaki. Nagasaki was not much better and Sweeney was just about to make a radar-guided run when Bombardier Kermit Beahan spotted a hole in the clouds and found an Aim Point two miles north of the briefed one.
As Bock’s Car droned overhead, a certain Shigeyoshi Morimoto was hurrying home to collect his wife and get her and his family out of town. He arrived at 11 A.M. Morimoto had been working in Hiroshima making anti-aircraft kites (used like barrage balloons to entangle low-flying planes) when Little Boy had exploded. He was protected from the blast by a building. He had made his way from Hiroshima to his hometown. In one of history’s brutal ironies, Morimoto was just describing the pika or bomb flash to his family, “First there is a great blue flash …” At precisely that instant, 1890 feet over the Mitsubishi Torpedo Factory (in another irony this factory had modified the torpedoes for the Pearl Harbor attack) the radar altimeter on Fat Man signaled the detonators to fire and a brilliant blue flash filled the room where Morimoto was telling his tale.
During one of his interviews with Paul Tibbets, the writer Bob Green asked him if he thought of the people who died at Hiroshima. Tibbets answered for the entire World War II generation: “Please try to understand this,” Tibbets said. “It’s not an easy thing to hear but please listen. There is no morality in warfare. You kill children. You kill women. You kill old men. You don’t seek them out, but they die. That’s what happens in war.”
********
So, how did the Vols do against The Maxims?
1. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win.
Tennessee made the classic error of reading their own press releases. They also saw the betting lines lines and decided, “Dude, we got this.” They also forgot that in any game, the other side gets a vote. Finally, I think Bazooka Joe and his receivers need to be handcuffed to each other 24/7 until the bus leaves for the airport on Friday. Fortunately, none of the Vols' errors were fatal.
2. Play for and make the breaks. When one comes your way … SCORE!
Only getting a field goal after a fumble recovery on the APSU 13 and then going three-and-out after an interception violates this Maxim in its essence.
3. If at first the game – or the breaks – go against you, don't let up… PUT ON MORE STEAM!
I really didn't see any exceptional effort even after the game was tied at the end of the first quarter. Although, I understand that Gerald down at Gus's Deli did do extra steam on a roast beef and Swiss.
4. Protect our kickers, our quarterback, our lead and our ballgame.
The highly-touted Vol offensive line mailed it in. The defense, for the most part, did not.
5. Ball! Oskie! Cover, block, cut and slice, pursue and gang tackle … THIS IS THE WINNING EDGE.
There was a noticeable lack of running with abandon, until the Jalen Wright show in the 3rd quarter. That said, the Vols did get over 400 yards in total offense.
6. Press the kicking game. Here is where the breaks are made.
Turbyville only mis-hit one kickoff. Our Aussi punter seemed to get himself sorted out and finished with a 43 yard per kick average.
7. Carry the fight to Austin Peay and keep it there for sixty minutes,
I don't know if Tennessee took the fight to them, but they sure as hell took it to the Vols.
Last week: “Past Tennessee teams have had a disturbing tendency to play at exactly the level of their opponents. HeadVol Heupel seems to have banished those ghosts.”
We need another exorcism.
Suggested Reading:
Steve Birdsall, Saga of the Superfortress. Doubleday, 1980
Richard B. Frank, Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire. Random House, 1999.
Bob Green, Duty: A Father, His Son, and the Man Who Won the War. William Morrow, 2000
Paul W. Tibbets, Return of the Enola Gay. Mid-Coast Marketing,1998.
Enola Gay returns to Tinian after the mission. (USAF)
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. Thanks OMG for another great analysis and read! Go Vols!
