Tennessee football: 5 heartbreakers Vols suffered right before facing Florida

1. 2009: UCLA beats Tennessee 19-15

When you factor in an upset loss that was also a heartbreaker and one that puts a damper on the Florida game, this 2009 UCLA Bruins game has all of those things. Tennessee football lost to UCLA to open 2008, but there was a UAB game between that one and Florida. Still, the UCLA loss sent the Vols in a tailspin that got Phillip Fulmer fired.

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This time, they were 1-0 after a dominant win over the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers and believed to be in a new era under Lane Kiffin. Things were simple. Beat a bad UCLA team at home to get to 2-0, and they could focus on launching a major upset over Florida.

Remember, this was the offseason in which Kiffin took all those shots at the Gators and everybody said that Urban Meyer would go out of his way to blowout the Vols as a result. So everybody in Rocky Top was anticipating that game.

In the process, they forgot about UCLA. Tennessee failed to convert and score touchdowns twice inside the two-yard line, settling for a field goal once and getting stopped on fourth down another time. Jonathan Crompton struggled all day, and UCLA made a very lucky second-half field goal.

All of these things led to a heartbreaking loss at home to a bad team. And yes, that heartbreaker carried over to the next week. The Vols lost 23-13 to Florida, a game that was shockingly close. But had they beaten UCLA, they may have had just the confidence necessary to pull off the upset. And that would have completely changed the outlook of the season.

Florida is now the biggest game of the year for Tennessee football. That doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon. However, the Vols have to focus on the games they play before the Gators. If they don’t, it can put a major asterisk on the game itself. Losing limits some of their motivation. So they can’t take other teams lightly.