University of Tennessee Athletics
Inside The T Mailbag: Goin' Bowling
December 04, 2014 | General
Each week, UTSports.com's Brian Rice answers questions from Vol fans on a variety of topics in and around Tennessee athletics. Send yours to him on Twitter: @briancrice or to UTSportsMailbag@gmail.com. On to this week's mailbag:
Danny: So what bowl game are we going to?
Wouldn't we all love to know. The SEC office will make the final determination on Sunday, based on a variety of factors. Here's the SEC selection process:
The winner of the SEC Championship Game automatically qualifies for a spot in the Cotton, Fiesta or Peach Bowls if that team is not selected to participate in the four-team playoff. Additional SEC teams may be selected for one of the CFP access bowls based on its ranking in the final CFP Selection Committee rankings.
After the CFP selection process the Citrus Bowl gets the first selection of available SEC teams. The Citrus Bowl would be required to take the runner up in the SEC Championship Game once during the six-year term.
After the Citrus Bowl selects a team, there will be a pool of six bowls (Outback, TaxSlayer, Music City, Texas, Belk and Liberty) and the Conference, in consultation with the institutions and the bowls, will make the assignments for these six bowl games from all eligible SEC teams.
This is where Tennessee falls in. The pool of six selection process is sort of like getting a residency after medical school. The schools make a list of where they would like to go, each bowl makes a list of the teams it would like to take and the SEC acts as the national board in matching the teams and bowls.
And that's why nobody can give anything more than a prediction at this point. It's not like previous years where bowl selections were like budding relationships and bowls and schools would flirt, have a couple of lunches, then a nice dinner, then make a commitment for the holidays. Now, nobody will know who's spending New Years (ish) with each other until Sunday afternoon.
If not selected to a pool of six bowl, the Birmingham Bowl and Independence Bowl have rights to the remaining teams.
As far as what time Sunday, that's a good question as well. ESPN will have selection programming and analysis after announcing the College Football Playoff teams and access bowls at 12:45 p.m. ET. It's possible that other bowls will be announced shortly after. It's worth noting that SEC teams will face the ACC in at least three bowls, and all non-playoff ACC selections will be held until a single ACC announcement at 5:30 p.m. Sunday, so it could be that late before we find out.
Carter: Since UAB football folded what's going to happen with the Nashville game scheduled against them next year?
As Dave Hart said in an interview this week, having to replace an opponent under these circumstances is unprecedented in college athletics. UT is working on replacing the game and still plans to stage the game at LP Field in conjunction with the Nashville Sports Council.
UT will have a formal announcement when an opponent has been secured, but with a solid payday and the opportunity to open the season in an NFL stadium, that will be a very attractive game for potential opponents.
Mac: Who made Butch Jones' awesome orange/blue plaid jacket? How can I get one under my tree for Christmas?
Coach Jones has a tailor in Cincinnati that he still uses to create his awesome jackets. They're all custom jobs, but I'm hoping to do a story with him at some point on the looks. I'm extremely jealous of the swag.
The orange and blue jacket has been a fan favorite for awhile, but I'm a big fan of the black patterned jacket he wore at Vanderbilt last week:
It's go time #VolNation! @UTCoachJones and the team are headed out. #LetsGoBowling #GoVols #BeatVandy pic.twitter.com/4GKozolC6C
-- Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football) November 29, 2014
Todd Kelly, Jr. has an incredible sense of style as well:
This week's #VolScholar is @ToddKellyJr6, majoring in Biomedical Engineering, hoping to become an Orthopedic Surgeon pic.twitter.com/TzP0jABAa7
-- Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football) November 30, 2014
Keenan: Are there any updates on Jalen Hurd's injury? Are there any other players, besides the guys who are gone for the season, that are in danger of missing the bowl game (IE: Malone, Croom, Young, Crowder)?
Hurd will be back for the start of bowl practice, and all of the guys you mentioned should play a role in bowl preparations. The time off this week and the less-condensed bowl practice schedule should allow this to be a very healthy football team by the time the final week of December rolls around.
Malone and Croom were dealing with nagging injuries for the later part of the year, Crowder was able to practice but not play against Vanderbilt. Young has been trying to come back from a rib injury, something that is a slow and difficult process. We'll have a better idea once practice starts back up next week.
Tony: I've seen you post screenshots from old Tennessee games and reference a video project you're working on. Can you talk about it yet?
Sure! We are currently tracking down the announcers for every televised football game that Tennessee has participated in.
The project started during Florida week when we were trying to determine the last time Brent Musburger had called a game at Neyland Stadium. Thanks to the gold mine of old games and highlights on YouTube, it's been a pretty easy, but very time-consuming project so far. There are plenty of televised games that aren't online or have only the school's rebroadcast online, so I'll probably have to dig into our broadcasting archives to find a few games.
There are some websites out there that track stuff like this, and while I'm using one of those, 506 Sports, as a reference, my OCD side is requiring me to verify it with my own eyes before publishing it.
There's no timetable on the project, I haven't been able to devote a lot of time during football season to work on it and with basketball and baseball/softball coming soon, it may be a project that continues on into the early summer.
Mary: Proud to have been in Nashville Saturday, have you ever seen a visiting team dominate a stadium like that?
No, not even close. I've seen plenty of really good turnouts over the years, both Vol fans on the road and occasionally an opponent in Neyland. But never have I seen anything like that. From my spot in the press box, all I saw was orange across the way, with the exception of the Vandy student section. I expected that the stands under us would be black-and-gold.
But when I left the press box for the fourth quarter on the field, I saw that, with the exception of a couple of sections, that side was almost completely orange as well.
Well done, Vol fans. Well done.
Zach: You tweeted at every stop, what was the best food from the road?
That's going to be the topic of tomorrow's Inside the T column, a step-by-step, calorie-by-calorie evaluation of where is most responsible for my future heart problems from the 2014 season.
But here's a preview. The best trip in total was South Carolina. The best meal is incredibly tough to choose from, but it's going to be from the Oklahoma trip. Full details tomorrow.
