January 01, 2005
Rick Clausen looked nothing like the third-stringer he was most of the season, leading No. 15 Tennessee to five touchdowns in just 2 1/2 quarters, and the defense had its way with No. 22 Texas A&M in a 38-7 victory in the Cotton Bowl on Saturday.
The Volunteers (10-3) had lost four of their last five bowl games, the last two by a combined 40 points. After never leading in either of those games, they made things different just seven plays into this one when Clausen's short pass to C.J. Fayton turned into a 57-yard touchdown.
Tennessee wound up with the most lopsided victory in its 45-game bowl history. The Vols came within 5:13 of their first bowl shutout since the last time they played the Aggies, way back in the 1957 Gator Bowl.
The rout was as much a result of the Volunteers playing perfectly as it was the Aggies self-destructing. For instance, A&M lost only one fumble in its first seven games, but gave away four this time. Three came in the first half, helping Tennessee stretch its quick 7-0 lead to 21-0 early in the second quarter, forcing the Aggies out of their game plan.
The Vols' plan was excellent, especially on offense.
Instead of relying on the rushing of Gerald Riggs Jr. and Cedric Houston, Clausen came out firing from a variety of formations and showed the poise and patience of a seasoned leader, not a junior transfer who was beaten out by two freshmen and was playing only because they were both hurt.
Clausen was 18-of-27 for 222 yards with three touchdowns, no interceptions and no sacks. He also handled a hostile crowd of 75,704 -- the game's largest since 1978, the vast majority dressed in A&M maroon -- by scampering around the backfield to make sure everyone heard his audibles.
That was the case until he took the crowd out of it completely.
Tennessee gained 306 yards by halftime, even though two TD drives went just 28 and 8 yards thanks to fumble recoveries. The Vols set another school bowl record with 32 first downs.
Riggs followed his career-high 182 yards in the SEC championship with 102 and a touchdown on 18 carries. Houston ran 13 times for 62 yards, enough to make him and Riggs the first Tennessee teammates to have 1,000 yards in the same season. He also had a touchdown before leaving with a bruised thigh in the third quarter.
A&M trailed 28-0 at halftime, but had a chance to make it a game when Terrence Thomas ran 54 yards to the 15 on the opening drive of the third quarter. Then quarterback Reggie McNeal was tackled from behind on fourth-and-1 from the 6 and the Aggies hardly threatened again.
They finally scored in the closing minutes on a 5-yard pass to Earvin Taylor.
The Aggies have lost five straight Cotton Bowls, while the Volunteers improved to 3-3 in this game. They lost their last one in 2001, when Clausen's brother Casey was the starter.
It was the eighth time in coach Phillip Fulmer's tenure Tennessee has won at least 10 games. This season was impressive because the team was filled with youth and set back by injuries. Next season, up to 18 starters could return.
Tennessee wore a small decal on the back of its helmets in memory of former star Reggie White, who died last week. It featured an orange cross with his jersey number, 92, in black across the center.
Texas A&M Postgame Notes
MCNEAL'S FIRST PLAY - On A&M's first offensive play, junior quarterback Reggie McNeal broke the school season passing record and reached the 6,000-yard level in total offense. McNeal completed a 12-yard pass to Earvin Taylor that moved him past former passing leader Mark Farris (2,551 in 2000) and made him the third Aggie to surpass the 6,000-yard barrier in total yards.
UNCHARACTERISTIC TURNOVERS MAR AGGIES' EFFORT --- One of the nation's best at protecting the football during the regular season, the Aggies gave up a season-high five turnovers in the loss to Tennessee. The Aggies matched their season-high of three giveaways in the first 16:48 of the game and then established a new season high with a fumble late in the fourth quarter. The fifth turnover came on a tipped pass on A&M's final offensive series.
Tennessee converted the four turnovers into 14 points, which was an opponent season high for points after turnovers (previous best was seven by several teams).
Coming into the game the Aggies had given up just eight turnovers in 11 games, and went turnover-free in seven games. Even with the five turnovers, the Aggies still established a school record for fewest turnovers in a season with 13. The previous low was 15 set by the 1992 and 1998 A&M squads.
BIG BOWL CROWD - Today's attendance of 75,704 marked the largest Cotton Bowl crowd in games involving Texas A&M. The previous best was 74,188 for the 1987 Cotton Bowl vs. Ohio State. It also marked the second-largest bowl crowd in school history behind the 76,503 that watched A&M and Ohio State in the 1999 Sugar Bowl.
MISCELLANEOUS -
- Texas A&M's Cotton Bowl captains were the 2004 Permanent Team Captains Terrence Murphy (Tyler, Texas / Chapel Hill HS) and Mike Montgomery (Center, Texas / CHS).
- The 12th Man Kickoff Team representative was John Ray, a sophomore walkon from Giddings, Texas. He served as A&M's 12th Man in every game in 2004.
- Junior Nurahda Manning started at rover, marking his first start of the season and the fourth of his career. Manning was the 18th different defensive starter used by the Aggies this season.
- Joining the game captains for the coin toss were Gov. Rick Perry (A&M Class of '72) and former A&M head coach Gene Stallings (Class of '56).
- Senior Terrence Thomas' 54-yard rush on a reverse in the third quarter was a career long. His previous best was a 29-yarder against Kansas State earlier this season.
- The 31-point loss marked the largest losing margin in a bowl game in A&M history. It eclipsed the 25-point margin in a 28-3 loss to Notre Dame in 1993.
Texas A&M Postgame Quotes
HEAD COACH DENNIS FRANCHIONE
(Opening comments) "Well, I like the way we played this year in regard to taking care of the football. And you can't help a team like Tennessee by turning it over like we did. (We had) three of them in the first I imagine 17, 18 minutes of the game. I'm not trying to take anything away from Tennessee's effort, they're a good team, (and they) deserve to be ranked where they are. We had a great Aggie crowd today. We just couldn't get any momentum going to get the crowd into the game to help us. We really appreciate the crowd that was there."
(On the turnovers changing the approach to the game) "Well, you have to alter your game plan. Obviously, you can't be as patient as you would like to be."
(On the turnovers altering offensive continuity and making the players tentative) "I don't know if we were tentative. It did get us out of rhythm. When you don't have the ball very much, your defense is on the field, you get behind. It forces your game plan to alter a little bit. We moved the ball decently at times. We just didn't hold on to it long enough to do what we needed to do. We had eight turnovers all year. (We had) five today. Go figure."
(On the effort of the defense) "I think we went into the game wanting to move around a little bit, just like their defense did. Sometimes you can get caught moving if they're on a quick cadence. I don't think that had a great deal to do with the outcome of the game. I think they physically won the line of scrimmage, and that had more to do with it than that by far."
(On Tennessee's game plan and physical play) "Well, we moved the ball right down the field on the opening drive. We got a little stymied after that. But, again, I believe the next drive or the one after that, we turned it over again in our end of the territory. I'm not trying to take anything away from Tennessee's game plan or effort, but sometimes we met the enemy, and it was us as much as anything. I think we can look back at this season and we've come a long way in strength, being prepared to play the physical aspect of the game. But when you play a Top 20 team, I don't know if we're quite there yet. We need more time to get there. We were way behind when we started two years ago. We made some giant strides. But I think the Texas game, the Oklahoma game, this game, those are games that we've got to continue to develop that strength to be able to control line of scrimmage better."
(On the effect the game will have on the offseason) "Oh, I think we're not going to sit around and tarnish completely what this team achieved this year. I don't think anybody planned on us being in the Cotton Bowl first week of September. You know, we don't feel good about the way today ended. You live with the last game of your season probably a little longer than any other game. But we'll learn some lessons from this game in regard to things that we need to do and certainly I think it will be lessons that we can take into the off season and build on them."
(On the senior leadership of this team) "This group coming together as a team like they did, that would not have happened without unselfish guys and the seniors, leadership council, the tone that they set for that to happen. Geoff (Hangartner) and Mike (Montgomery) and Terrence (Murphy) and Keith (Joseph) and so many of these guys made major impacts on that. You don't have good seasons without leadership. You don't have good seasons without seniors that lead. We don't have very many, but they did a good job."
DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR CARL TORBUSH
(On Tennessee) "I've been around Tennessee long enough. I knew what they were going to play with. They are a very talented football team, and in my opinion we're not where they are yet. I think we're heading in that direction. Coach Fulmer and his staff have done a great job year after year. That's why they have a chance to compete for an SEC championship and national championship every year."
(On the play of Texas A&M) "By no means did we play anywhere near where we can play. I thought it showed our players what we got to do to get better to give us a chance to compete against this type of football team."
(On Tennessee's game plan) "They kept us off balance a little bit early. They did some things that we probably didn't anticipate. They took the two-back, tight end set and spread them out all over the field. I thought us being offsides on the third down at the beginning of the game was important. We had them stopped and they were going to punt and we gave them the first down and they hit the touchdown pass on the next play after we missed two tackles."
(On A&M's tackling in the game) "I don't think we tackled very well. I thought early we were fairly physical but as the game went along I thought they were the more physical football team. When you don't tackle as well as you need to and then have five turnovers on top of that, you're not going to win many football games."
QUARTERBACK REGGIE McNEAL
(On the game and how to learn from it) "Well, today, we didn't execute. We had too many mistakes. We had, what, seven or eight turnovers all year, then come in here and we have five. We've just got to continue to make an emphasis on that at practice, I mean, just get bigger and stronger during the off season."
(On the running game) "Once we got down, we had to get back into the game. We couldn't have come into the game just wanting to run anyway. They had a good football team. We got into a situation where we had to throw a little bit more than what we usually do."
(On the first two turnovers) "Oh, well, on the pitch, I mean, I'm going to take responsibility for it. But, (Courtney and I) are usually on the same page. It's something that never happens, but it did. On the other one, I just had to hold on to the ball and I didn't. We work on that every day at practice. It's just something that didn't work for us today."
(On a loss like this diminishing the season) "No. It's just going to make us work harder in the off season. When we get back to this point next year, we don't want it to happen again. It will stay on everybody's mind. You can't just sit there and dwell on it."
OFFENSIVE LINEMAN GEOFF HANGARTNER
(On what Tennessee was doing defensively) "I don't think we were confused. We were prepared for everything they came with. We didn't obviously execute well enough to win the game."
(On ending senior year in a bowl game) "It was nice to come to a Bowl game this year, but it's always probably going to be a sour feeling for me. I never envisioned my last game, you know, going out and playing in the Cotton Bowl and losing. I mean, I never even thought about that. That will hurt a little bit, but I'm happy I got the opportunity to go to a Bowl game my senior year, for sure."
DEFENSIVE BACK JAPHUS BROWN
(On the speed of Tennessee's offense) "Looking at the offense, I think they were real fast. But as far as tackling, I think we could blame that on ourselves. We came out and missed a couple of tackles. I don't think their speed was the blame of that. But I think we just missed tackles. When you miss tackles, you lose ballgames. I guess that's what happened today."
DEFENSIVE BACK BYRON JONES
(On Tennessee's early passing game being perhaps a bit confusing) "Well, first of all, I don't think what they were doing was confusing. I just think we weren't thinking, pass as much, we were probably concentrated on the run a little bit. I think it probably surprised us a little bit they came out and started throwing the ball."
Tennessee Postgame Notes
NOTING TENNESSEE
- Tennessee finishes the season 10-3 (7-1 SEC); Texas A&M's final record stands at 7-5 (5-3 Big 12)
- The Vols entered the game ranked No. 15 in the Associated Press and No. 17 in the USA Today/ESPN polls. Texas A&M was ranked No. 22 by the AP and No. 25 in the USA Today/ESPN poll.
- Today's contest marked Tennessee's 16th consecutive postseason bowl game.
- The Volunteers are now 9-8-1 all time vs. current members of the Big 12 Conference.
- Prior to today, the Vols' most recent New Year's Day appearance was a 45-17 win over Michigan in the 2002 Florida Citrus Bowl.
TENNESSEE-TEXAS A&M SERIES
- With today's win, UT's all-time record vs. Texas A&M improves to 2-0. Until a fourth-quarter Aggies' TD today, the Vols had held them scoreless for seven straight quarters.
- Prior to today, the only meeting between the two programs came in the 1957 Gator Bowl, in which Tennessee defeated the Aggies 3-0.
PHILLIP FULMER'S RECORD
- Tennessee head coach Phillip Fulmer's record is now 123-31 (.799) in 13 years with the Vols.
- The Vols have now appeared in 13 bowl games under Fulmer, compiling a 7-6 mark.
- Fulmer now stands alone in ninth place on the SEC's coaching wins list, as today's win gave him 123 for his career.
- The Vols have now enjoyed eight 10-win seasons under Fulmer. Tennessee ranks sixth all-time with 19 such campaigns.
- Under Fulmer, Tennessee owns a 53-4 record when it rushes for at least 200 yards in a game.
TENNESSEE'S BOWL HISTORY
- The Vols' all-time bowl record now stands at 24-21. Entering this postseason, Tennessee's 23 bowl victories tied for third most in the nation (trailing Alabama's 29 and USC's 27 and tied with Penn State and Oklahoma).
- UT's streak of 16 consecutive postseason bowl appearances ranks third in the country behind Michigan's 30 and Florida State's 23.
- Today's game marked Tennessee's 29th January bowl appearance and its eighth in the last nine years.
UT IN THE COTTON BOWL
- Tennessee has played in six Cotton Bowls, with a record of 3-3. The Vols' other Cotton Bowl berths came in 1951 (20-14 win over Texas), 1953 (16-0 loss to Texas), 1969 (36-13 loss to Texas), 1990 (31-27 win over Arkansas) and 2001 (35-21 loss to Kansas State).
TENNESSEE SCORING PLAYS
- Junior WR C.J. Fayton's 57-yard touchdown catch on UT's first possession of the game was the longest catch of his career. That play also marked the longest completion in the career of junior QB Rick Clausen.
- Sophomore FB Cory Anderson's first-quarter TD catch was his second receiving score of the season and his third career touchdown (all have come this season).
- Senior TB Cedric Houston scored on an 8-yard run in the second quarter, giving him a team-best eight TD rushes this season.
- Senior WR Tony Brown's first catch of the day was good for a 13-yard TD in the second quarter. The reception also made the co-captain the only Vol with at least one catch in every game this season.
- Junior TB Gerald Riggs Jr. scored the Vols' fifth touchdown of the day on a 9-yard scamper midway through the third quarter.
- Sophomore K James Wilhoit connected on a 37-yard FG late in the third quarter. Wilhoit finished the year 10-of-17 on FG attempts.
HOUSTON, RIGGS RUN INTO RECORD BOOKS
- Riggs ran the ball 18 times for 102 yards today, marking his sixth career 100-yard outing (all this season).
- Riggs' 102 rushing yards is tied for 10th most by a Vol in a bowl game.
- Houston netted 62 yards on 13 carries today. This year marks the senior's first career 1,000-yard season, as he finished with 1,005 yards.
- With 2,634 career rushing yards, Houston moved past former Vol Jay Graham (2,609 yards from 1993-96) into fifth place on UT's all-time rushing-yardage list.
- Houston's first three runs of the day - and four of his first five - all went for first downs.
A VOLUNTEERS FIRST: TWO 1,000-YARD RUSHERS
- Houston (1,005) and Riggs (1,107) give Tennessee its first 1,000-yard rushing duo in school history.
- Riggs reached the 1,000-yard mark in last month's SEC Championship Game loss to Auburn, and Houston surpassed the 1,000-yard mark on a 6-yard rush with just more than 10 minutes to play in the third quarter of today's game.
- This season, Riggs (6) and Houston (8) combined for 14 rushing touchdowns and 2,112 rushing yards.
CLAUSEN COOL UNDER CENTER
- In his second trip to the Cotton Bowl, junior QB Rick Clausen set a new career-high for touchdowns (3) while completing 18-of-27 passes for 222 yards.
- Clausen finished the season with 949 passing yards and eight touchdowns.
- Clausen transferred to UT from LSU, which lost to Texas 35-20 in the 2003 Cotton Bowl (Clausen did not play in that game).
- Clausen's older brother, Casey, was Tennessee's QB when the Vols made their last Cotton Bowl appearance (a 35-21 loss to Kansas State in 2001).
BIG ORANGE MILESTONE WATCH
- Tennessee's 32 first downs today set a new school bowl record, breaking the old mark of 29 first downs vs. Northwestern in the 1997 Citrus Bowl.
- Tennessee tied a school bowl record with four fumbles recovered in today's game.
- Sophomore DT Tony McDaniel made his first career start today.
- Freshman LB Ryan Karl made his first career interception today.
DEFENSIVE NOTEBOOK
- Fumbles: Sophomore DT Turk McBride recovered a Texas A&M fumble in the first quarter. Sophomore DT Justin Harrell then forced a fumble which was recovered by SS Corey Campbell (a native of Spring, Texas) later in the first quarter. Senior DB Corey Larkins recovered a fumbled punt early in the second quarter. Junior FS Jason Allen forced a fumble in the Texas A&M red zone with less than one minute to play in the third quarter that was recovered by junior MLB Jason Mitchell.
- Interceptions (1): Karl (1)
- Sacks (1): Harrell (-10)
- Tackles for Loss (4): Reynolds (-1); Gaither (-5); Harrell (-10); Fellows (-2)
- Passes Defensed (3): Fellows (1); McDaniel (1); Gaither (1)
- Senior LB Kevin Burnett led the Vols with six tackles today. Free safety Jason Allen added five stops.
- With a team-best 123 tackles on the year, Allen becomes the first defensive back to lead the Vols in tackles for a season (defensive statistics were first kept in 1970). All of UT's previous season leaders have been linebackers. Burnett finished the year with 120 total tackles.
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES
- The Vols converted four Aggie turnovers (all fumbles) into 14 points today.
- Today, senior P Dustin Colquitt broke UT's all-time records for games started (51) and game played (52).
- Junior OG Cody Douglas, a native of La Marque, Texas, entered the game at right guard at the 14:32 mark in the second quarter, marking his first game action since UT's home loss to Notre Dame Nov. 6.
- Junior MLB Jason Mitchell tackled TAMU's Reggie McNeal for no gain on a fourth-and-one attempt in the Aggie red zone early in the third quarter.
- Sixth-year senior QB C.J. Leak lined up under center on the Vols' final drive of the game.
- Former Vols greats Andy Kozar (1950-52) and Hank Lauricella (1949-51) served as honorary UT captains for today's game. Both men starred in Tennessee's 1951 Cotton Bowl win over Texas and are being inducted into the Cotton Bowl Hall of Fame in April.
- Today's attendance at the Cotton Bowl was 75,704, marking the largest Cotton Bowl crowd since 1978 (Notre Dame 38, Texas 10) and the fourth largest in the game's history.
Tennessee Postgame Quotes
HEAD COACH PHILLIP FULMER
(Opening comments) "Obviously, I'm very, very proud of our football team and staff. We had a really good week in Knoxville preparing right after finals and came here I think very intent on playing well. (That was) probably our best effort of the year as a team, or at least in some time. The offense was playing well, defense playing well, and special teams playing well. It's been a struggle at different times during the course of the year because one side of the ball would play exceptionally well and the other side of the ball would fight its rear off. We'd find a way to win, but not always as pretty as we'd like. Today against a very fine offensive team, our defense really made a comeback from what it had been doing the last couple of weeks. I'm proud of that. The secondary challenged themselves. It's a young football team in a lot of ways, (and there's) a lot to look forward to in the future if we can come back with the same kind of work ethic and attitude that this team had. As I told the team inside, I'm very grateful to the seniors and their leadership, particularly the captains and their leadership. It's been a wonderful year that way."
(On coming out throwing the ball instead of running) "I think it helped us open it up some. Rick has done extremely well throwing the football. Obviously getting on the board early and first kind of got them backed up a little bit. Then after that, it was kind of pick and choose what you really felt like you wanted to do because I think we had them on their heels some."
(On A&M's turnovers) "It is uncharacteristic. We set a goal to get four and I think we ended up with five. You saw the kids each time talking about it. I think our team speed helped us. Our first game maxim is the team that makes the fewest mistakes wins. We've really been trying hard to take care of the football. We did a heck of a job of that. Our defense did a great job of hitting, getting their hands up. There was even an opportunity for a couple more. That was one of the ways we felt like we were going to win the game."
(On the enthusiasm of his team) "You know, there's not any magic dust out there that you just sprinkle on somebody and say, 'Let's be excited.' If you would have asked me Thursday, our Thursday practice was about as bad as we've had this year, to be honest with you. I mean, these guys know, I'm sweating bullets. I say, 'We may get run out of the stadium.' But young people are resilient. We talked about being here, the great opportunity we had. I told them, 'This is a tremendous bowl, the tradition of this bowl, to put the exclamation point on this season was extremely important.' We talked a bit after practice yesterday, not that talk has anything to do with it. They came out and got it done. Then obviously this morning, we talked about, you know, the same thing, about what it's going to take to win the game, not so much X's and O's but from an emotional standpoint. We felt like if we played to our level, and we played well as a team, not just one side of the ball. In the third quarter of the SEC championship game, I mentioned this, we played as a team. That was the first time in a long time. Then we've built on that. So hopefully we'll build on it even more in the future."
(On the recent bowl tradition of Tennessee versus that of A&M) "Well, A&M is as good a tradition as anybody in the country. Just recent tradition, I guess this group of kids (A&M) didn't go last year. Before that, I think they may have. I don't remember. But, you know, I think it helps us, the experience of it. The last couple we've had, haven't been great experiences, but you draw on 2001, we played Michigan and won the game going away. I think us having another game (SEC Championship game) and continuing to play probably helped us some. I think we went at it in practice pretty good back in Knoxville. We came down here and right off the bat had a pretty good scrimmage on Tuesday. I think our kids were physically ready. You run a little bit of risk of injuries or whatever. But we were physically ready to play this game and emotionally ready to play this game. Obviously, the way it started off, it really kind of mushroomed on A&M. They're probably a better team than what they played today. You also look at it, they took Oklahoma to the last play of the game. We used that to get our kids excited, too."
DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR JOHN CHAVIS
(On the game) "We expected to play well. Sometimes I think you get into some passive positions when you don't. We really put some emphasis on that. We did and the players did and we expected to play well. I'm really proud of what they got done."
(On the five turnovers) "We talked about it last night. Texas A&M had done a great job of taking care of the football all year. Coach Fran(chione) even mentioned it at the Big Play Luncheon that they only had eight turnovers. Our guys were bound and determined to get four. That's what our goal was to go in this game and get four turnovers and we got five. I'm really happy with that. That was the mentality to go out and try make that happen."
(On the Vols offense today) "A lot of our success on defense you have to give our offense some credit because they kept the ball. I think on our offense we had one three-and-out. When you get time to rest and time to regroup, it's a lot easier to play defense. When you have to play after three-and-outs, it's not quite as easy. Our offense did a tremendous job. We wanted to get the shutout but holding them to seven points is a great feat for us. And again, you have to give our offense a lot of credit because they kept the ball."
FREE SAFETY JASON ALLEN
(On Tennessee DB Roshaun Fellows) "Roshaun has the potential to be one of the elite cornerback in the country. He's just got to continue working hard, continue developing his skills. He definitely has the ability to be one of the elite corners in the country."
(On this game being one of Tennessee's most complete games this year) "We knew it was going to happen. We wish it could have happened in our last game. But it happened today and it's something to build on for next year. We have a lot of people coming back. We're a young team. We're looking forward to going into next season."
QUARTERBACK RICK CLAUSEN
(On the season) "I'm just really happy the way things turned out, not only for myself but for the team. We got 10 wins and we got to come to Dallas. This is the first time we played together as an entire team. This is just going to jump start us for next year."
(On catching Texas A&M off guard with its passing attack in this game) "They knew we would try to come out and run the football but I don't think they thought I would be able to get the ball to the receivers as well as I did early on. I've got to give a lot of credit to the receivers. They ran great routes. They made plays. They made people miss and they got yards. The running backs got yards; they got out in the routes. Our offensive line all year long has been so tremendous. I don't think I got sacked today."
LINEBACKER KEVIN BURNETT
(On what he expects from Tennessee next year) "I told them 'Do not be satisfied'; think national championship every year. Don't ever be satisfied with anything less than a national championship."
(On comparing this win to Tennessee's win over Michigan in the 2002 Florida Citrus Bowl) "It's close but I think I like this one because it's more recent."
(On Tennessee's team speed on defense) "We could see their players pulling. By the time they turned up, we were already in the backfield. I think our speed did play a factor but the biggest part was preparation."