Clint Stoerner 98 Arkansas

"Why are these two plays going against each other in round one rabblerabblerabble?" Well, we're not real sure what to do with this one in a Best Plays Bracket. It is unquestionably one of the most iconic moments in the history of Tennessee Football. It is one of the most important moments of the BCS era. But in this crowded field, just how great of a play is this? Outsiders are going to say this is a play where a guy falls down, and that may technically be the case. We call the play "Clint Stoerner 98" because that's how we all identify it, but this is also "Tennessee Defensive Line 98" - surging the interior line back, putting a foot where it's not supposed to be, perfectly placed for Stoerner to trip on it and leave the ball and our hopes on the ground, right there for Billy Ratliff to pounce on it. In our year of years, this is the best example of Tennessee simply finding a way to win.

Dwayne Goodrich 98 Florida State

Speaking of finding a way to win...having just broken a scoreless tie in the National Championship Game, Florida State decided to force the ball to Peter Warrick, and Dwayne Goodrich made them pay. This is so clean and such a thing of beauty - watch through the commercial break and after the kickoff for the replay where Al Wilson runs by Warrick and taunts him during the return. It was 14-0 Vols and all of us were thinking blowout at this point. We needed every touchdown we got in the end, but so much of what went right for the Vols in Tempe was on the shoulders of Goodrich and Steve Johnson, who absolutely shut down Warrick all night long.

We'll be back next week with the quarterfinals...

A story by Wes Rucker at GoVols247 ($) this morning suggests an awful possibility: the new SEC Basketball schedule, with the addition of Missouri and Texas A&M, could mean only one annual home-and-home rivalry series for each team in the conference. I have no concrete idea how the powers that be would structure an 18 game schedule, but Rucker's story includes quotes from both Cuonzo Martin and Dave Hart suggesting that if only one annual rivalry series was allowed, the Vols would draw Vanderbilt...meaning Tennessee and Kentucky would play each other only once per season more often than not.

You can make the math work several other ways - a 14 team league playing 18 conference games certainly allows for five annual home-and-home rivalry series for each team while playing the other eight opponents only once each year. I have no idea why we're not going in that direction, though I suppose some schools could find that setup unfair or unbalanced (I'm sure all of us would want Kentucky, Vanderbilt, and Florida twice a year under a model like that, which might make it harder to win the league, but then again life has never been easy in the old SEC East in basketball).

Only one annual rivalry series means you would see the other twelve opponents through the other sixteen games - four home-and-homes each year on a rotating basis, I assume. Of course, the Vols will still play Kentucky and everyone else in the league at least once every season, but we'd only get to see UT/UK home-and-home one out of three years (I think - there's math involved, and I'm the wrong writer for that).

What I hate about this even more is that I guarantee you Kentucky will draw Florida in this format. Most of the other matchups for annual rivalries make sense (Alabama/Auburn, Mississippi/Mississippi State, some combination of Arkansas/LSU/Missouri/A&M, us and Vanderbilt), which would leave UK/Florida and Georgia/South Carolina. The Cats and Gators have had a lot of sizzle in the last decade, no doubt, but no team in the SEC has beaten Kentucky more than Tennessee. I realize UK is the biggest rival for a number of teams in this league, but no team in this league is a bigger rival to them than we are. And not that we wouldn't enjoy two chances to beat on Kevin Stallings every season, or that UT-Vandy isn't a rivalry...but man, it just doesn't seem right to have a season where Kentucky doesn't come to Knoxville or Tennessee doesn't go to Rupp.

Peyton Manning 96 Georgia

This is Peyton Manning at his most absurd. First play of the fourth quarter, Vols up 22-10 and can put the game away with six points. It's third down, so if the sneak fails, the Vols kick a field goal and Georgia is still only down two possessions. So I'd wager many objects were thrown across living rooms throughout the state of Georgia when this happened. How many other quarterbacks could not only instinctively look to make a play in a situation like this, but actually pull it off so well? Manning directs Marcus Nash and then fires right to him for the score that ended the threat. His grin and "good call" conversation with Fulmer and Randy Sanders on the sideline are just icing on the cake.

Casey Clausen 03 Alabama

How did we make this look so easy? In the second overtime of what would've been the second straight loss to Alabama and the third straight loss overall, times were very stressful. Given the way regulation went and the way 2002 had gone, there was a real chance Randy Sanders might've left Tuscaloosa unemployed. But ice cold, no mistakes was once again the theme in a hostile environment. Casey Clausen buys enough time from what little pressure there was for C.J. Fayton to complete his route, and #7 finds him easily for a first down to keep an amazing football game alive. The Vols went on to win in five overtimes, and Tennessee made sure Alabama would have to wait a few more years to regain the edge on The Third Saturday in October.

Tennessee doesn't win the National Championship without...

Deon Grant 98 Florida

In another fun side conversation, I think the two games featured today are the two best performances by a John Chavis defense at Tennessee. This one is certainly more famous, and features one of the most athletic individual plays ever made by a Tennessee defender. Tied 17-17 in the fourth quarter and Florida already four turnovers in the hole, the Gators still kept coming and had just converted 3rd and 7 to midfield. When Jesse Palmer let this ball fly, the guy sitting next to me in Z11 goes, "Interception!", and I distinctly remember thinking he was out of his mind. Because Derrick Edmonds is beat. He's beat with no one behind him, and this is field goal range at best and a touchdown at worst. Because there's no way Deon Grant can close that much distance in time and make any sort of play on the ball. But I should've known better. Because on this night, there was no way our defense was going to let us down. The video is from the Phillip Fulmer show, so it lacks John Ward's original call of "A STERLING interception," but he was, as usual, exactly right.

Peerless Price 98 Mississippi State

What happens when you start buying into destiny and all that is you never really think you're going to lose a game like this, and then fourteen years later you've forgotten how close we came and how very important this play was. Mississippi State had 87 yards of offense, a defensive touchdown, a punt ran back for a score, and a 14-10 lead on the Vols with less than seven minutes to play. On the previous play, Tee Martin and Travis Stephens got lucky that an MSU defender didn't blow up the handoff and cause a fumble. And the Vols made them pay immediately: in a preview of coming attractions, it's Martin to Price for a critical touchdown. The degree of difficulty is actually higher here than the Fiesta Bowl: MSU's defense again pressing everybody up, Tee Martin paying the price in the pocket, and Peerless having to contend with better coverage and less room. And the result is just a thing of beauty - Tee Martin is one of the more underappreciated deep ball throwers at this university, and this pass is just absolutely perfect. So is Price's footwork to stay in bounds. On the next offensive snap, MSU fumbled, and on the next offensive snap, it was 24-14 and we were headed to Tempe.