What happened?? (Speculation encouraged)

Nobody cares about South Carolina. If we are worrying about recruiting with them then we have bigger issues. We need to focus on Bama, FL and UGA and stealing those recruits.
Exactly... Beamer bet hope we don't put 70 on them next year in Neyland.

For whatever reason [we don't know] TN didn't even act like they wanted to be there yesterday. South Carolina is a joke that we "allowed" to beat us.

We'd drill that team 10 out of 10 at their place but something has happened -and it's not all of sudden SC is good.
 
What happened to our defense?? Banks didnt play. Offense wasn’t good either. Hooker kept underthrowing receivers. I know we gave up 24 to Mizzou last week but we turned it around. What happened today?
Nothing wrong with offense. We had over 500 yards of offense. What you mean?
 
Attacking defense philosophy? When will we see it lol
Actually we have seen it this year. We were getting sacks and tons of quarterback hurries and tackles for loss up until the Georgia game. Our backend struggled but we were winning upfront especially in the 2nd half of games. Last night we did not get the pressure we have gotten most of the year. We appeared a step behind from the get go. We didn’t play well but credit South Carolina they played a great game especially Rattler he threw the ball better than he has all year. It’s over now, time to move on and whip Vandy. I have confidence this group will come back and play hard next week. GBO
 
First, SC played great and deserved the big win. Second, Jeremy Banks importance to the defense cannot be overstated. Third, I believe the rumors may be true that there was some kind of internal conflict between Banks/Hooker. It may have spread through the defense in their support of JB. Something was not right with the defensive effort last night.
 
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Just listened to CJH after game press conference….he gets it. They did not play well. Some bad breaks, bad calls, under and overthrown balls, and SC came to play, at home, and played the best game of their season. That happens. Ask Bama, LSU, and Florida. I’m expecting a total butt whipping by Tennessee on Vandy in Nashville next week if our injured can play near 100% and the refs call a fair and balanced game.
 
I wasn't able to watch (thank god) due to driving back from picking up my daughter from UTK for Thanksgiving. Just from listening it was obvious, for whatever reason, this defense simply didn't want to play. Period.
 
Game plans are created based on tendencies you see on a team’s tapes. In game defensive adjustments are difficult when that team goes completely away from their tendencies and you don’t have the dudes on your roster talented enough to carry out any adjustments. You play with what you have, good, bad or ugly and last night was ugly as hell.

Our offense has carried this team during the season by getting out in front of teams and forcing them to be more one dimensional playing catch-up. A badly out of sync offensive game just sets up our defensive weaknesses to get massively exploited.

While it sucks royally you have to give props to SC for their change up, going after our defensive weaknesses successfully and putting them on their heels from the kickoff.

This is a painful learning experience for both players and coaches. It will ultimately make the Vols a better and more complete team down the line.
 
I didnt see much pressure at all. Thars why rattler had such a good game
Our edge guys beat the Carolina tackles quite a bit. Check it out again if you can and really focus on our D-line.
Although I would probably caution against watching that debacle again and just take my word for it!😂😜
 
Just do like Cristobal in Miami. If you don't want to play with heart and desire, there's the door. A lot of players nowadays as the newer generations, get a sense of immediate benefits. Someone forgot to tell them they have to put the work in first.
 
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What happened?

They were down 2 running backs and were forced to take it to the air. Rattler was hot and burned the secondary.

Big MO with the home team. End of story.
 
Nobody cares about South Carolina. If we are worrying about recruiting with them then we have bigger issues. We need to focus on Bama, FL and UGA and stealing those recruits.

If you don't think the Carolinas are, or should be, an important part of our recruiting strategy then I don't know what to tell you. Our demise over the past 10+ years is a key factor in Clemson's rise imo because they were able to do what we did for so long - recruit very well in the Carolinas and Georgia. A rising Carolina team under Beamer is not going to help on top of already competing against Clemson and, yes, that obviously includes Bama, FL, and UGA.
 
Exactly... Beamer bet hope we don't put 70 on them next year in Neyland.

For whatever reason [we don't know] TN didn't even act like they wanted to be there yesterday. South Carolina is a joke that we "allowed" to beat us.

We'd drill that team 10 out of 10 at their place but something has happened -and it's not all of sudden SC is good.

Quite the myopic take
 
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The folks that are saying certain coaches need to go I have a question. Should Rodney Garner be fired? Our defensive line got absolutely no pressure on Rattler last night which led to a lot of the completed passes. Deion Sanders couldn’t cover a receiver that long. I personally hope we can keep the staff together for another year. By the way I think ‘Rodney Garner has got about as much as he can other players he has to work with.
Jimmy and joes matter as much as x and o
I get what you are saying, but we had these Jimmie and joes when we beat AL, LSU, FL, etc. We obviously missed JB, but the guys have to play with desire. We were not gang tackling, flying to the ball, or selling out to stop their offense. I don’t know why the unit flopped last night, but it was ugly and disheartening to the fans and, I would guess, to the players as well. If there was tension between players before, it may be ramped up this week with finger pointing and blame. The defense should have been able to limit SC to a hell of a lot fewer points. The lack of defensive effort could result in a really bad outcome this coming weekend.
 
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Something definitely strange about last night. Sc is not good. "What a turn of events" as Kesling would say.
 
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Just do like Cristobal in Miami. If you don't want to play with heart and desire, there's the door. A lot of players nowadays as the newer generations, get a sense of immediate benefits. Someone forgot to tell them they have to put the work in first.
Hit the portal hard and strip scholarships from the linebackers and db’s. The dline is the only functioning unit on that side of the ball. We’ve got solid recruits coming in, but need to fill holes with portal and JUCO guys.
 
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We needed to change our offensive philosophy completely. We kept throwing on 1st down and when it didn't work and we got a first down, we did it again, and again. Pretty soon it was like we can't run cause they think we are going to and they'll stop it, so we threw it again. We ended up at 2nd and 10 too many times and then had to throw and so on. I think we could have just run the ball and slowed down the game. We needed to be like every other team we played because USC was scoring on every possession.
 
What happened to our defense?? Banks didnt play. Offense wasn’t good either. Hooker kept underthrowing receivers. I know we gave up 24 to Mizzou last week but we turned it around. What happened today?

I think Hooker was pressing when we had the ball in order to try to make up for all the blown plays by the defense. I have lived in GA for over forty years. I remember when UGA fired Martinez due to his poor performance as a DB coach. I think he has been on our staff twice (including his current position) since he was let go by UGA. Our pass rush is not capable of getting to the quarterback without blitzing. I remember hearing the announcers commenting that USC jr started four seniors in their offensive line. I am not impressed by Banks defensive schemes. I have been attending TN games since 1963. We once were known for our great defenses. I do however remember the 38 to 0 blowout to Ole Miss and Archie. I believe in one of Peyton's years Florida scored 62 on us.

You play offense for show and defense for dough. Championships will never be one with defenses that play like ours. Head coaches get paid to make hard decisions. He is going to have to make decisions that he does not want to make regarding coaches. It is a tough call this year since we have commitments from four or five highly rated DB's in the Dec signing class.
 
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