OneManGang
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Tennessee vs The Maxims vs Bowling Green
Opening Day in Big Orange Country always brings about a sense of nostalgia for the graybeards among us. This is because for a few all too brief moments, Our Beloved Vols are Undefeated, Un-tied, and Unscored Upon. For you neophytes who have come to Volunteer family over the last 20-30 years, that was the proudest boast of The Gen'rul's era whence for the 1939 season the Vols posted precisely those accolades. Indeed, the streak had started in November, 1938 with a 45-0 shellacking of Chattanooga beginning an NCAA-record streak of SEVENTEEN consecutive victories by shutout. To The Gen'rul and his boys that statistic was far more important than the ethereal designation of Tennessee as National Champions for the 1939 season. The streak was broken by Southern Cal who won the 1940 Rose Bowl against a hung-over but proud bunch of Vols 14-0.
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It was 0800 on New Years Day, 1943. Tommy Blackburn stood at attention before a collection of Navy pilots and ground crew at Oceana Naval Station in Norfolk. Tommy read a printed order from the Commander, Naval Air Forces, Atlantic establishing U.S. Navy Fighter Squadron 17 and announcing himself as its Commanding Officer. The unit's official designation was VF-17 or simply Fighting 17.
Never one for extended inspirational speeches, and nursing a hangover from the previous evening's revelries, Blackburn told his unit, Report for duty at 0800 tomorrow. Dismissed.
After working up with temporarily assigned F4F Wildcats and SNJ advanced trainers, Fighting 17 received its assigned fighters, 36 of the legendary F4U Corsairs. Blackburn and Fighting 17 would go on to carve out an enviable war record.
The Corsair was one of the most distinctive planes of the Second World War. Its huge thirteen-foot diameter prop caused the Vought designers to adopt an inverted gull wing design to keep it from striking the deck. Once seen, the F4U could not be mistaken for any other plane in the sky. Pilots called it the bent-winged bird or simply the U-Bird. Powered by a Pratt & Whitney R-2800 engine, with lots of armor protecting the pilot, six .50 caliber machine guns and able to carry up to 2000 lbs of bombs and rockets, the Corsair was a formidable warplane by any measure. It also had oil coolers mounted in the wing roots which made a high-pitched whine at high speed.
The Japanese who found themselves under its guns dubbed it The Whistling Death.
As Fighting 17 neared active deployment, Blackburn decided his outfit needed an insignia. Rejecting most animals and such as being overdone, Blackburn settled on a black pirate flag with its leering Jolly Roger and so Fighting 17 also gained its nickname.
Lt. Ira Ike Kepford of VF-17 in his F4U-1D. Kepford finished the war with seventeen confirmed kills. The massive Pratt & Whitney R-2800 engine produced so much torque that the Corsair's rudder had to be deflected slightly right even in level flight.
- US Navy
Fighting 17 and its Corsairs were originally assigned to the new carrier USS Bunker Hill (CV-17) but some limitations of the Corsair's design had already made themselves known.
It's difficult to wrap one's mind around the fact that when the prototype XF4U-1 took to the skies in 1940, the standard US Navy fighter was the Grumman F3F which was a biplane that could do about 250 mph in dive. The new Vought fighter was the first American single engine fighter to exceed 400 mph in level flight. The big fighter also topped out at 515 mph in a power dive in 1941. The Navy knew it had a winner. What they didn't know was that it would take nearly two more years to work all the bugs out.
Aside from various minor (and some not so minor) issues common to any new fighter design, one problem in particular threatened to keep the U-Bird off carrier decks permanently.
Basically, the Corsair liked to bounce on landing. The landing gear was too stiff and when the plane chopped power and dropped onto a carrier deck there was a very high likelihood the plane would bounce over all the arresting wires and crash into either the carrier superstructure or, worse, into planes parked near the bow. The problem had not shown up in early flights because the dynamics of landing on a 4000 foot runway and on the pitching deck of a carrier are entirely different.
Finding itself the owner of a thousand or so F4Us that were too dangerous to issue to the Fleet, the Navy sighed and gave them to the Marines to use from island bases. Used to getting outdated Navy castoffs, the Jarheads took to the rugged Corsair with glee and forged a relationship which survives to this day. Neophyte Marine Aviators in 2015 who were born forty-odd years after the last U-Bird flew in American service still look at one of the surviving Corsairs with a bit of nostalgia.
Needless to say, Vought worked around the clock to solve the gear problems and Blackburn's VF-17 was supposed to take the F4U-1D incorporating the new gear and many modifications based on combat lessons onto the Bunker Hill when they were ordered to conduct their operations from land bases in the Solomon Islands. Eventually Fighting 17 returned to carrier duty and after several mutations still exists today as VFA-103 flying F/A-18 Hornets and still carrying the Jolly Roger.
In his book, Blackburn lists some sixty pilots who served in VF-17 during their first combat deployment from October, 1943 to March of 1944. Fifteen of them made ace with five or more kills. There are also the names of thirteen men forever patrolling the skies in their U-Birds.
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Game One for Team 119 is in the books. The Bowling Green Falcons put up quite a fight but the Vols superior firepower carried the day, Like the Navy with the early Corsairs, there is still a lot of work to do for the Vols and many problems to correct. One thing stands out though, Butch Jones and the Boys in Orange PMS151 of Team 119 are going to be winners.
So how did the team do compared to the Maxims?
1. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win.
ZERO turnovers for the Vols. The Gen'rul smiles. Bowling Green converts on all three fourth down attempts. The Gen'rul glares.
2. Play for and make the breaks. When one comes your way SCORE!
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Verily. Tennessee converted on all but one of its trips inside the Red Zone.
3. If at first the game or the breaks go against you, dont let up PUT ON MORE STEAM!
Vol faithful from Ducktown to Dyersburg muttered a collective "uh,oh!" when the Falcons kicked a field goal with 5:31 left in the 2nd Canto to close the score to 21-20. However, Tennessee's Steely-eyed Missile Man took control and directed an eleven-play 75-yard touchdown drive that settled Bowling Green's hash.
4. Protect our kickers, our quarterback, our lead and our ballgame.
The Vols' defense needs to eat some Wheaties. Stellar offensive line play kept Josh Dobbs relatively unscathed.
5. Ball! Oskie! Cover, block, cut and slice, pursue and gang tackle THIS IS THE WINNING EDGE.
Despite a noticeable improvement in Tennessee's overall defensive effort with lots of Orange shirts flying to the ball, Falcon quarterback Matt Johnson shredded the defense for over 400 yards passing. Not even in the same time zone as good enough. On offense, the debut of Alvin Kamara, who led all Vol rushers with 144 yards, combined with the proven Jalen Hurd (123 yards) gives Tennessee a one-two combination at running back that will have SEC defensive coordinators reaching for Tums by the handful. The Vols missed a rushing hat trick by only five yards with Dobbs rushing for 95 net.
6. Press the kicking game. Here is where the breaks are made.
Punter Trevor Daniel had a very nice debut averaging 47 yards per kick. Seasoned veteran Aaron Medley, however, came down with a case of the yips missing two of three field goal attempts. Cam Sutton had some nifty returns.
7. Carry the fight to Bowling Green and keep it there for sixty minutes.
The Falcons fought Tennessee all the way to the end. That, in itself, is precisely what a team of talented but young players needs as a reality check after the relentless feel good press and fan enthusiasm of the last six weeks or so.
Your fearless scribe has told anyone who would listen over those weeks that this is a process. Coach Jones is somewhat ahead of schedule right now, but Tennessee is in no way, shape, form, or fashion ready to contend for an SEC crown although nothing would make this Old Vol happier than having to eat those words.
Brick by Brick, Baby!
MAXOMG
Suggested Reading:
Tom Blackburn, The Jolly Rogers
Boone T. Guyton, Whistling Death
Barrett Tillman, Corsair
© 2015
Keeping Your Stories Alive
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