Tennessee football: Don’t blame Vols fans if Georgia can Checker Neyland

Georgia Bulldogs fans may try to checker Neyland Stadium against Tennessee football Saturday. Don’t blame Volunteers fans if the UGA Dawgs pull it off.

This would be the most embarrassing of situations for Tennessee football. There is no greater way to show how the mighty have fallen than for fans of an opposing team to publicize things they’ll be able to do at a program’s stadium on the road.

Such is the case for the Georgia Bulldogs. An online trend has started for them to Checker Neyland Stadium in red and black Saturday. The Vols were known under Butch Jones for doing Checker Neyland in orange and white at different times each season.

However, after Tennessee football fell on hard times and changed coaches, they went away from that and the Smokey Gray uniforms. Here comes Georgia, at 4-0 and in the top five, looking to cash in on a once-proud program that is 1-3.

Jeremy Pruitt, to be fair, said Monday he doesn’t think Georgia will pull that off. But what’s so embarrassing about that is Pruitt scrapped all of those random things when he took over as head coach to note that uniform combinations and gimmicks don’t win games. And he’s right.

The problem is the fact that Tennessee football is not winning games without it. And if Georgia somehow pulls this off Saturday, not a soul in the world should even think about blaming Vols fans for somehow being disloyal.

These fans filled up Neyland Stadium just one week after losing at home to the Georgia State Panthers. They were ready and loud for a night game against the BYU Cougars, only to see their team choke away a sure win.

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That is all part of what was once dubbed a decade of dysfunction but is now 12 years of dysfunction. It’s what led to the fans rallying to nix the Greg Schiano hire in the first place two years ago after Jones was fired, eventually leading to Phillip Fulmer taking over as athletic director and Pruitt then being named head coach.

How did these guys respond? They took away the fun things that involve the fans such as Checker Neyland and the Smokey Gray uniforms, they have limited public access such as media sessions with players and coaches and the Big Orange Caravan, and they have lectured the public about lack of support, such as Pruitt complaining about not enough fans at a spring game.

All of that would be forgiven, however, with wins. But where are the wins? They haven’t arrived. As a result, if Georgia pulls off Checker Neyland on Saturday, it won’t be an embarrassment to Vol fans. It will be an embarrassment to the Tennessee football administration.

Years ago, Bruce Pearl more publicly did something similar to Georgia. His first year as Tennessee basketball’s head coach, he organized for a bunch of fans to travel to Athens when they faced the Bulldogs, noting that the program was struggling.

There’s nothing wrong with Georgia doing the same thing. Anybody angry about what happens, if it does happen, should solely take it out on the administration. Otherwise, they are completely missing the mark.