LARGETONY Blog

I have a love / hate thing about night time football games.

I love the sound of the crowd crackling against a cool (well, cooler than daytime, anyway) sky. And it reminds me of the fun of football games back in high school.

What I hate is the waiting. Waiting around all day for the game to begin. And when you lose, you’re just waiting to get out of the stadium, into you car, and home. You have those waits when you win, too. But, when you lose, it makes the already long day seem even longer.

I thought about this on my long drive home tonight (actually, this morning, since it was well after midnight before I got outside of Knoxville’s city limits). The long, quiet, drive home. Much longer and quieter than it would have been had Tennessee beat Florida.

Neyland Stadium, where the Vols play, is considered one of the loudest college stadiums in the country. Not only because of it’s sheer size (108,000 capacity) and shape (instead of a low wide bowl like a lot of stadiums, it’s very steep and deep. I swear sometimes when you stand up in the upper rows, you feel like you are going to tip forward like you are on a ledge. And all that sound just swirls around inside bouncing off the walls of people). But, add to that the fact that Tennessee is known for its really boisterous fans. The combination can really give fits with play calling for the opposing team.

But the only time I have heard it quieter than it was at the end of tonight’s game, is when players have been seriously injured and the crowd is awaiting some sort of news about it. And given the fact that most everybody stayed the whole game, it was surreal how quiet it was. Even the Gator fans were quiet…relatively, anyway.

But, since it was a home game, there were way more Tennessee than Florida fans in attendance and our quiet drowned out any of their joy. The silence was deafening.

All because of one point. It’s the second week in a row we have had a game decided by one point. Last week it was in our favor. This week it was not. Florida beat Tennessee by that one point, 21-20.

Strange as it may seem, it’s easier to accept getting your ass handed to you than to miss it by one point. At least then you can leave the stadium, seething with complaints and embarressment, comiserating with your fellow fan. But your teams plays well, and loses by one point, you just don’t know what to say. So, it’s just…quiet.

Quiet, leaving the stadium. Quiet, walking to your car. Quiet, the long drive home.

Generally I enjoy listening to the post-game call-in programs on the radio as I make my way back into the hills. But tonight, I didn’t even bother to tune it in. I just rolled down the windows, hit the pedal, and listened to all that quiet.

Home never seemed so far away. It seemed like the longest drive ever.

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 17th, 2006 at 3:11 am and is filed under football. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.