Tennessee football: 5 reasons Vols will beat the Florida Gators
1. Tennessee has more motivation.
It’s been 20 years since the 1998 national championship team, and the game that got them going was their 20-17 overtime win over the Florida Gators. After five straight losses and Peyton Manning’s inability to get the win, that was a huge confidence booster for the team as a whole.
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The 1998 team being honored for that game is one thing that will have an impact on Jeremy Pruitt’s first team. One thing you have to remember about that game is Florida should have won. They were outplaying the Vols. But Phillip Fulmer’s team was so motivated that they were not going to lose, and they found just enough plays to win.
It was basically channeling years of frustration into key plays. This Tennessee football team is going to do the same thing Saturday, especially with the 1998 team in attendance. Just like that team, these guys no they’ve given too many games away to the Gators.
You could legitimately make the case the Vols should be on a five-game winning streak against this team. But after last year’s loss, these guys want revenge. They know they were the better team, and they gave the game to the Gators.
To make matters worse, for some reason, everybody wrote this game off as a loss for the Vols to start the year. That was the case even though the Gators needed a Hail Mary to beat them last year in The Swamp, both teams finished with only four wins, and they both have new head coaches this year who are changing the schemes on offense and defense.
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Despite all of that, Florida is somehow a four and a half point favorite AFTER losing to the Kentucky Wildcats at home. Sure, the Vols lost to the West Virginia Mountaineers. But if both teams are 2-1, Florida has the worse loss and all those other factors come into play, why in the world are they a favorite coming into Knoxville? This is the motivation the Vols need, and they will want to win more badly than Florida. That’s going to be the biggest factor on Saturday.