OneManGang
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Tennessee vs The Maxims vs Florida
It stinks - Coach Butch Jones
Well, yeah.
Your humble scribe felt from the beginning this week that every season the Vols start out against Florida as 7-point underdogs as soon as the gun sounds on the previous year.
Why, you ask?
Simple.
The Vols' attitude is (and has been since the Fulmer era) against teams like Florida and Alabama that, Gee, wouldn't it be great to win this game! We can really say we've arrived.
Teams like Florida and Alabama approach their games against the Vols with the attitude that, We're going to win this thing.
And therein lies the difference.
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One of the most meaningful things for an historian is to be able to actually touch history. This is one of those times. I recently bought a 1952 edition of The War Against Japan which is part of the famous Green Book series of official Army histories of the Second World War. The War Against Japan is part of a three-volume Pictorial Record subset. On the title page is a signature noting that this book once belonged to Sam S. Boldrick, Lt. Col., Arty. This is his story as told in his notations on the pages inside.
On the inside cover of the book there is a map of the Pacific Ocean. Col. Boldrick used a red pencil to map his journey. He went from San Francisco to Fiji, Fiji to Guadalcanal, thence to New Georgia ending his combat tour on Bougainville. After Bougainville he returned to San Francisco via Canton Island and Pearl Harbor.
Col. Boldrick was part of the 140th Field Artillery Battalion (Light) attached to the 37th Infantry Division. The 37th Division was raised from the Ohio National Guard and naturally was nicknamed the Buckeye Division. The 37th Division had seen extensive service in World War I and some of its component units could trace their heritage back to the Spanish-American War and the Civil War.
The 37th arrived in Fiji in June, 1942. They were there to fortify the islands and to conduct intensive training in preparation for combat. Fiji was paradise compared to where they were going. In April, 1943 they moved to the fetid and festering jungles of Guadalcanal.
A picture shot during the fighting on Guadalcanal of burning Japanese ships has the notation, I have pictures of the burned out hulks of these ships. He states over another picture of the rescue of survivors from the transport SS President Coolidge that he had sailed to Fiji on board the Coolidge and that it was a beautiful ship. A road along a hilltop bears the notation, I walked and rode daily along this track.
From Guadalcanal, they moved to Banika Island. And he duly notes where the 140th FA had its headquarters. Part of the 37th went to Arundel Island.
Tom McCabe was wounded on Aurundel. This is a typical MANGROVE swamp. - US Army
He took part in the invasion of New Georgia and arrived with the rest of the Division to take part in the invasion of Bougainville in November. To set the stage, Bougainville is a fiddle-shaped island at the north-western end of the Solomon Islands which include Guadalcanal and New Georgia. The Japanese had a huge naval base at Rabaul on the New Britain which is part of the next group of Islands called the Bismarks. The Japanese had a big airfield at Kahili on Bougainville and that would place American planes closer to Rabaul. Japanese Admiral Yamamoto had been shot down and killed near Kahili.
Results of a Japanese air raid over Bougainville, 20 November. Went through this. A miserable night. - US Army
The notes end shortly after. Col. Boldrick's map shows him leaving Bougainville and returning to San Francisco, but there is no reason given. Was he wounded? Reassigned?
I don't really know. There is no veterans group for the 140th FA and no mention of whether or not he was its commander. Given his rank he might have been.
To an extent it doesn't matter.
He did his bit.
Lt. Col. Boldrick is buried in Marion County Kentucky, having died there in 1998.
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The Vols, from top to bottom have GOT to learn how to win big games. Unfortunately, the only way to learn how to win big games is by actually winning big games.
And so it goes.
So how did the team do compared to the Maxims?
1. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win.
One would think that when your team is ahead with time running out in the fourth canto and your opponent is facing a 4th down and 14, that victory is a near certainty.
One would think that.
2. Play for and make the breaks. When one comes your way SCORE!
Florida was five-for-five on 4th down conversions during the game. Has Tennesee replaced 3rd and Chavis with 4th and Jancek? Stay tuned.
3. If at first the game or the breaks go against you, dont let up PUT ON MORE STEAM!
Allowing your opponent to score fourteen points in the final four minutes of the game fundamentally violates this Maxim.
4. Protect our kickers, our quarterback, our lead and our ballgame.
The experiment of converting Joshua Dobbs into a drop-back passer is not working. Let him play his game.
5. Ball! Oskie! Cover, block, cut and slice, pursue and gang tackle THIS IS THE WINNING EDGE.
The Vols' defense has been regarded as the team's strong suit up until now. The fundamental problem, once again, is that they simply run out of gas late in the game and that is directly traceable to the feckless recruiting that marked UT football from about 2006 onward. God, in the SEC, is on the side of the big battalions. The Vols are still at least one and probably two excellent recruiting classes away and no amount of hype or enthusiasm is going to change that.
6. Press the kicking game. Here is where the breaks are made.
No real complaints here except that UT needed to be about 15-20 yards closer on that final field goal attempt.
7. Carry the fight to Florida and keep it there for sixty minutes.
Note to Team 119: 58:15 does NOT equal 60:00. You are welcome.
It doesn't get any easier. Playing an SEC schedule is not for the faint-hearted or for those who dwell on what could have been last week. Every single game is going to be a struggle and will often come down to who has the most and the freshest troops available in the fourth quarter. So far, the Vols seem lacking in that department.
That will change but probably not this year.
Vol fans have absolutely GOT to accept that this is a process. The Vols ARE better than they were last year. However, they are not there yet. The rebuilding of Tennessee football cannot be rushed and closing your eyes and wishing very, very hard won't change that.
For that matter, this writer would like to see what Butch Jones could have done with the talent that John Majors left for Philip Fulmer. Unfortunately, what we are seeing is essentially the same scenario that Majors, and for that matter, Doug Dickey walked into when they accepted the mantle of Head Vol. And neither of them faced the recruiting and scholarship restrictions faced in 2015.
Calm down. Buckle up. Better days are ahead.
But it still stinks.
Brick by Brick, Baby!
MAXOMG
Suggested Reading:
US Army, The War Against Japan
Henry Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas Kane, USMC, The Isolation of Rabaul
John Miller, Jr., Cartwheel: The Reduction of Rabaul
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Keeping Your Stories Alive
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